The Red Eyes are pleased to announce RED ARMY, the long awaited follow up album to their 2007 release Rudeworld, accompanied by an extensive national tour. 3 years in the making, RED ARMY delivers a painstakingly produced album set to capture the massive live sound that The Red Eyes have become known for around the country. If an energetic performance is something that audiences expect from Melbourne’s favourite Dub/Reggae monster band, then this album will not fail to please. More extroverted than their last release, RED ARMY uses diverse production, from live studio takes to intricate programming, to blast their unique sound into an explosion of styles and see the group once more defying simple genre descriptions.
The title, RED ARMY harks back to the formation of the workers movement, representing, symbolically, the blood shed by the working class in its struggling against oppression, and the belief that all people are equal. For The Red Eyes, the title suggests an egalitarian sentiment while also reflecting on the iconography and themes of war that underpin almost every culture around the globe.
From tracks such as Titokowaru’s War, which tells the tale of battle against colonial attack led by one of New Zealands early Maori leaders, to The Road to Jericho, based on a dream that merges stories of the biblical crusades with the recent invasion of Iraq and the war in Afghanistan, the album touches on the struggles and bloodshed that have marked every epoch in world history. Also touching on local issues, Inside Out was inspired by the spotlight on street brawl deaths in the bands home town of Melbourne during 2009.
Other sentiments within the album include the universal disparity between political leaders, corporate giants and the everyman. While songs like Higher Ground comment disparagingly on the popular branding of ‘environmentalism’ by politicians despite an obvious lack of action to tackle the serious issues facing our planet, other tracks like Highplace and Sticks and Stones encourage us all to fight the system, to look up and rise up.
Of course it wouldn’t be a Red Eyes album without some heavy dub party tracks, such as Ultra Magnetic, about the healing power of music, and I Get Wild / Wild Gravity, a cover of a Talking Heads track (the bands only recorded cover song) about unleashing the primal side of civilized man and getting wild... something that The Red Eyes are continuing to practice, both on and off stage! Get Ready, The Red Army is coming!!