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Sunday Happenings
Enter Shikari are either a concert promoter's worst nightmare or a dream come true. The U.K. quartet made mincemeat of the stage at Harpers Ferry last night as they used monitors like footstools, dragged mic cables through swarths of crowds like a leashed dog in heat, swung atop Harpers' supporting bars, drinking bars, and stacks of speakers like a monkeys gone mad, and managed to break a keyboard stand simply by placing frontman Rou's gigantic synth on top of it. And yet, despite the veritable structural breakdowns, a band like Enter Shikari is hard to come by; with the wave of a guitar, the scrappy youngsters managed to conduct a couple hundred eager, scrappier tweens in an hour-plus of fully-engaged mosh pit mayhem. All on a Monday night.
Prior to the night's madness, Enter Shikari approached the Harpers stage with a certain level of incredulousness, and for good reason. Back in the U.K., these four kids took their D.I.Y. ethic, punk rock intensity, and trance fanaticism to the top of the charts in 2007 and continue to play sold out shows in large venues. Stateside, Enter Shikari's existence isn't exactly the kind of frontline news as it is across the pond, and their first trip to Boston left much of the cavernous Harpers Ferry empty. Though perturbed, the group launched into some new material, which the surprisingly-eager crowd immediately took to heart.
What followed next was something akin to the sets that have garnered Enter Shikari its rabid fanbase back home. Frontman Rou, bassist Chris, and guitarist Rory treated the stage like a veritable wrestling mat, pounding the surface like an athlete before a match, but with a certain childish enthusiasm, and took turns planting themselves in the crowd. These three spent more time either in the air, in the crowd, or balanced on some odds and ends structure than actually on the physical support known as the stage, an endearing aspect that the crowd certainly took to heart. And just to show that the show wasn't all about them, Rou challenged the crowd to create the tallest human pyramid, which the audience kindly responded to by barely missing one of Harpers' giant supporting bars.
Though it was a sight to behold, the set was far from flawless. The band often had to take breaks because their instruments or the sound would itself break; Rou's keyboard stand fell, his mic cut out, and the sound bustling through the PA would often burst out into one gigantic mishmash of incoherent sound. Beyond just the physical constraints, a good chunk of Enter Shikari's set list was rather flaccid, and a good chunk of their new material pales in comparison to the emotional strength and aggressive pull of the singles off of their debut album, Take to the Skies. All things considered, the rare chance of seeing a massively popular foreign band in a small space tear through the roof (literally) made for a show that certainly took to the skies.
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