The Heard Eye – “Send Barron”

The Heard Eye – “Send Barron” – Single Review

As much as I might wish that we didn’t have to give the Orange Authoritarian’s family any oxygen whatsoever, I’m realistic about the role that art & music plays in documenting who we are and what’s happening out there on this floating rock we share.  It’s always been crucial, and I think there’s definitely an argument to be made that it might be more important right now than the majority of the years in our collective history.  We’re making all kinds of mistakes & unforced errors right now…and we’ll be lucky if we’re somehow able to pull up and out of this horrific tailspin we seem to be trapped in.  Was has come to our doorstep once again, the doomsday clock barely has any room to tick much further in the march towards our doom, our sense of truth is altogether fucked, and we’re in some serious trouble.  Either you see that, or you don’t.  I’m not here to speak to the delusional that think everything’s fine right now.

“Send Barron” does not mince words, and it’s definitely direct when it comes to what The Heard Eye is saying.  While I 100% completely and totally support what they’re saying here from my own personal perspective, I’d also like to point out the full list should be a hell of a lot longer than just 47’s dirtbag mongrel kid.  There’s a whole bunch of warhawks & warmongers in that corrupt-ass administration that are wayyyyyyyyy too comfortable with the idea of sending YOUR kids to fight wars, as long as that means they don’t have to send their own.  This is also not unique to this administration – this is just how the war machine works and perpetuates itself inside the snake skin of government.  Again, if you’re missing that…if you’re not seeing that that’s exactly what’s happening…I can’t help you – no one can.  There’s nothing I’m going to write here that would be able to convince you – you’ve made your choice to put the blinders up permanently.  As much as The Heard Eye has done a solid job with their new single, including the message and meaning behind it, no song would be able to convince you either if you haven’t realized by now just how bad things have become on a geo-political scale, and certainly down south in the USA.  Should we “Send Barron” to the front lines of “his daddy’s war?” – bet your ass we should!  The point is pretty damn clear overall though – there should never be a situation where you’re asking someone else to sacrifice themselves for something you wouldn’t yourself.  Anything else is just cowardice, not leadership – especially when it comes to fucking war!  So yes, “Send Barron” and send the kids of every member in congress and/or in any governments around the world that are happy to sign off on dropping bombs and doing dumb shit.  This shouldn’t be a controversial stance – from my perspective, this concept is common fucking sense.

Right!  There’s a song in here somewhere…and I should talk about what that sounds like too I suppose.  It’s kind of like what you’d expect to find if the Stones set out to make a Grunge protest song.  So…in that respect, sound-wise it’s kind of got a foot in a couple of worlds, and truthfully straight-ahead Rock and Grunge tend to be naturally at odds with each other in most cases.  Which leads to kind of a push/pull feeling when you’re listening to “Send Barron” – you might be bound to like specific parts of it, more-so than you might dig the song as a whole.  The way I see it, that’s just fine – as long as you find a way into a song like this, then the message and sentiment continue to circulate, and eventually it gets heard the way that it should be.  The band executes at a high level, and from what I can tell, they must have hit the mark of their intentions for what “Send Barron” was going to sound like.  You’ll get what I mean when you have a listen for yourself, but it’s got this angsty vocal approach from singer Paul in the verses (especially in the second minute) that has a hazy grunge-like attitude to it, and then he sharpens his focus for the chorus to bring it closer to a traditional Rock style sound.  If there’s one thing to be sure of though, it’s that “Send Barron” will likely remind many of you of what it was like to listen to the old Vietnam protest music when it was originally coming out, and how crucial it is for art & music to hold the powers that be accountable at a time where seemingly nothing else will.  Complete with stand-out elements like the keyboards from Kevin and some hot-ass guitar licks from Nick, The Heard Eye storms through this single with the assured confidence of knowing they’re on the right side of history when making a musical argument like this song creates.  It’s got some murk and mystery to its atmosphere, but the chorus is where clarity reigns supreme, and if there was an ambiguity in what you hear from the music to the microphone, it all disappears so that we can universally understand the message being beamed out to us through this song.  It’d be hard to complain about the execution here…it all works – and whether or not it’s your style of sound or not, seems to hardly matter at all.  The Heard Eye plays “Send Barron” with such a convincing level of conviction that hopefully they’ll pull some folks out of their political coma to join the rest of us in the battle against a governing ideology that says it’s just fine for YOUR CHILDREN to go to war, but not the children of those in power.

Because sincerely, fuck allllllll of that bullshit.

“Put him in a Humvee, give him a gun” – “Send Barron.”

Find out more about The Heard Eye at their official website:  https://theheardeye.com

Ya ha!  This link right here is the key to being the next artist or band featured here at sleepingbagstudios, so instead of just ignoring it, click it instead!