Red Team Go!

Portraits by Monica May

Screw sitting pretty. If you miss (and want) meaningful rock music, punk/garage crew Red Team Go! (RTG!) is all about making statements.

Formed in August 2006 in Los Angeles by vocalist Daniel Park, guitarist Yong Kim, bassist Eric Nam, and drummer Sunn Wee, RTG! is hardly contrived or glib. It calls its home the “poseur capital of America,” and its name was picked for feeling “like a punch in the face.” Simply, RTG! is pissed.

“I don’t wanna wait around and meekly talk to people [or write] about how unhappy I am on my blog,” Park says. “I want to get the fuck out there and scream it in people’s faces. What do we have to be so angry about? Plenty.”

That irreverent, in-your-face attitude pervades RTG!’s work. On their debut album Origins & Happenings, songs like “Lyrangitis” boast lyrics both snarky (don’t tell me to open my fucking eyes/they’re narrowed into slants so I can focus on your lies) and keenly accusatory (our women are coy yet sex-hungry vixens/got a whole generation of pissed-off children). Liner notes sock the music business (“The Sunset Strip will try its best to rip you off...no wonder the Sunset Strip sucks now”) and make deadpan claims (“If you disagree you are wrong”).

Park’s on-key vocals are typically screamy, tempered with a SoCal softness that belies what he’s singing, and other Origins tracks are similarly conflicted. Spunky, mischievous, swig-swaggering guitars jump-start “Fade Away,” yet are covered by a repetitively obnoxious (but catchy) chorus. The slow guitar intro in “I’ve Fallen” is poignant, but it quickly consolidates, lining up in an awkward jog before being overwhelmed by directionless vocals. But “Red Flag Down on 6th Street”—inspired by the L.A. riots—is the album’s gem. Driven and energetic, the song has a feel-good chorus that includes the phrase “murderer or martyr,” which sticks in your head after just one listen.

Ultimately, RTG! wants revolution. It envisions the creation of a “true music scene”—communities of like-minded artists who support each other—and an all-media onslaught to achieve new culture. Between making posters, throwing events, and producing books, RTG!’s members aim to become a revolutionary band with a new sound. “We’re not there yet,” Park adds. But at the rate it’s going, RTG! might get there sooner than you think.