Post hardcore band all set for Newcastle gig on Friday

Matt Westcott spoke to guitarist Rory Clewlow ahead of the gig.

This is your first full headline tour for two years, how excited are you about going back on the road?

It’s really exciting, after doing so many really tough support tours and festival tours in America, it’s amazing to be back on familiar ground doing our own headline shows again. We have got a whole new lighting rig to play with too, so we think that this tour will be one of our best so far.

The venues you are playing are on the smaller side rather than the Arenas that you played as support to 30 Seconds to Mars. Was this a conscious decision and why?

Well I guess at this point we are still building up to our album release, so we don’t want to blow our load too soon. Also, playing smaller shows are important to us because it’s where we came from, and we don’t want to lose that.

You've taken to promoting your own shows, why is this and do you like the idea of taking control?

Yeah, that’s pretty much it. When you use a promoter, you have a lot less control. Sometimes you get security that don’t look after the fans and stuff, this way we can tailor the whole night to exactly how we want it.

When it comes to music, what is inspiring you at the moment?

We are currently on tour with two bands that are really inspiring for us - Your Demise and Letlive. Apart from that, we are always keeping up to date with the electronic music scene. We always bring a pair of decent speakers into our dressing room and play each other new stuff we are listening to. The other day Rob (Rolfe) was playing loads of classical stuff, then later Rou (Reynolds) was playing Gorilla Biscuits, and then Chris (Batten) was playing some Twin Atlantic, so it really is such a diverse range of things we find ourselves being inspired by.

Are your songs more about highlighting the negative in society than the positive?

We feel there is an urgent need to address and rethink the way we are living our lives. There are a lot of the problems in the world at the moment that are a direct result of the the way the most powerful nations have evolved. We are trying to raise awareness as to the reasons why the current system is causing so much suffering around the world in an attempt to try to improve the situation.

There are so many socially accepted things that people see as "normal" but when you break them down and analyse them, they are in fact, very insane and destructive. We are already seeing evidence of people waking up to this way of thinking, like the recent Wall Street protests for example, so i guess we do talk a lot about the negatives in our society, but only in an attempt to help create a more positive world.

Where do you see the band heading in the next few years?

We never expected to reach the level of success we have now. We see Enter Shikari as just a hobby that got a bit out of hand, so we just take each day as it comes and keep doing our thing and hope that people stay interested.