ReeToxA are on a roll. A couple of months ago, they dropped Soliloquy, a self-funded 26-track debut album that by any measure is one of the most ambitious independent releases to come out of Australia in recent memory. Now Melbourne frontman and former Royal Australian Navy sailor Jason McKee is back with “War Killer”, the first single pulled from that record to get a proper push – and it’s one of the more unusual origin stories you’ll hear for a punk song.
The backstory goes like this: during Melbourne’s COVID lockdown – the longest and most restrictive in the world – McKee was deep in a creative marathon that eventually put him in hospital for six weeks. During a rare break, he switched on the television and saw Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un walking together in apparent peace. For someone who spent a decade in the Navy being briefed that North Korea was an unstoppable existential threat, the image hit differently.
McKee is open about knowing nothing about politics and not pretending to. What he felt in that moment was simpler – the bewilderment of watching something you were trained to fear apparently dissolve over a phone call, and the frustration of not being able to celebrate it without it becoming another front in the culture war. That tension is what “War Killer” is built from. The track channels the spirit of Sham 69’s “If the Kids Are United” – unity as punk rock aspiration – and it came together in the band’s first take after a beer and tequila break at The Avenue Studio in Cheltenham, with producer Simon Moro and McKee both immediately recognising they had something that would get people talking.
It’s a sharp move for a debut single push: politically charged enough to generate conversation, but grounded in a genuine and somewhat naive sincerity that keeps it from feeling like posturing. McKee isn’t preaching or telling you what to think about Trump or North Korea. He’s describing what he saw and raising some interesting questions. That’s a more interesting punk position than most. With a UK and European tour reportedly in early talks for later this year, “War Killer” is a good foot forward for taking ReeToxA‘s story somewhere new.
