After a summer of playing high-profile festivals across Europe, Enter Shikari have announced a UK tour to see off the end of this year with support from Cancer Bats and Engine-Earz Experiment. The tour kicks off in Manchester on the 6th December followed by each city getting two shows each (except Newcastle on the 9th).

These dates are their first proper UK headline tour since their show last March which saw them sell out London’s 5000 seat capacity venue, Hammersmith Apollo. They have just played Reading & Leeds festival, and will now venture back to Australia for some headline shows and then to America for six weeks.

If you’re wondering why there are double dates, Enter Shikari’s vocalist Rou Reynolds said this about the tour: “With the last set of UK shows being the biggest ones we’d done so far, there was expectation and pressure on us from some directions to move up into bigger rooms for this tour, as the ‘media perception’ of looking like you can play an arena (even with half of it curtained off) is apparently supposed to be of some worth. But when you factor in the basic facts of charging fans higher ticket prices so they can watch you from further away from the stage, and be charged £6 a pint into the bargain, it starts to feel like quite a cost just to be able to limply say “we played Wembley”, so we made the choice of actually going smaller for this tour and doing double nights instead. It will be nice to be able to spend some time in the cities too. Having chance to lie in, then walk around a bit and do some Christmas shopping will be a welcome luxury (not a lot of room to spend time relaxing anywhere when you spend 9 months a year in a tour bus). Maybe we’ll throw a couple of after-shows in some places too, as me and Rob love an opportunity for some post-show DJ action when we don’t have to travel afterwards. Playing with artists like Cancer Bats and Engine-Earz as openers will be great too. Both of them are amazing and each brings something completely different to the show, and we’d like to think it will be giving the fans the chance to experience a really exciting and musically diverse bill”.

Tickets go on sale Friday 31st August at 9am priced between £18 regionally and £20 London (subject to booking fee).