Review
Enter Shikari – Common Dreads (album 2009)
Album review by Iain Dalton
AT FIRST glance you wouldn’t expect Enter Shikari’s second album to be a hotbed of radicalism. But the first track presents you with a call to arms against a ‘heedless and harrowing future’ of ‘factories of slavery’ and ‘wars of illusive bravery’.
The band’s fusion of hardcore punk and rave conveys their powerful lyrics surprisingly effectively. You can hear the anger in the album. The third track, ‘Step Up’ rips in with the lyrics:
“Sometimes I do wish apples were our currency, So your hoarded millions would rot in their vault, Then that’d teach you to lay off the assault, That you’re barraging on the lands of the poor.”
The song ‘No Sleep Tonight’ says on the environment that: “The sun and the sea could power us, no-longer cower in a oil lust” and tells those responsible that if it was up to them (the band), “You’re not getting any sleep tonight”.
‘Fanfare for the Common Man’ launches into the Iraq war, saying: “We think we have the right to enforce democracy, when we’re weakening ours everyday, what a hypocrisy.” ‘Wall’ uses the metaphor of that object for a society that tries to numb us to what is going on, noting that “freedom is not the choices between what job and what car.”
‘Juggernauts’ comments that under capitalism society is: “Constantly relying on consuming to feel content, But only because we’ve lost touch with this home that we’ve spent, Trillions of dollars tainting for our wants, not our needs.”
‘Step Up’ poses the question: “Why is it so many companies, Built to serve us, End up ruling us?” The album doesn’t answer this, for that you need the weekly Marxist analysis in The Socialist.
However, ‘Juggernauts’ poses another question about the behemoth of world capitalism, and an answer that I hope all workers and young people will reach over the next few years.
“What the hell will happen now? I really don’t know man, We’ll do what we’ve always done? Shut our eyes and hope for the best? NO! We’re gonna face this, We’ll step onto the tracks, And stare it right in the face, Thou shall not pass.”