#295 RED ALERT by Malcolm and the Mirrors (1982)

RED ALERT by Malcolm and the Mirrors (1982)
Maranatha! Music - AS 0004A

Producer: Thom Roy

File Under: New Wave

Time Capsule-Worthy Track:

Can't Live Without Him

In the early to mid 1980s, some people were just certain that President Ronald Reagan was going to get us into a nuclear conflict with Russia, either accidentally or on purpose. The good folks in Resurrection Band were as scared of the Soviets back then as "progressives" are of Russia today. In the end, they got everybody all stirred up for nothing. As a result of Reagan's policy of "Peace Through Strength," along with his considerable personal charm and negotiating skills, the Soviet Union was dismantled, the Berlin Wall came down, and we won the Cold War without firing a shot. But there for a while, some folks were just sure that we were goners. This record, with its warnings of nuclear war and the coming apocalypse, came from that same mindset to a degree...except that these guys were Brits and referenced British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher by name rather than Reagan.

The album's title track is about Cheyenne Mountain, a missile base set up as a US defensive during the Cold War. The song talks about men who are not killed, but merely "rendered inoperable." References to the 'red phone' and 'finger on the button' were frightening enough...but Malcolm Wild pretty much scared the crap out of me when he screamed lyrics like these:

Whatcha gonna do when the bombs start fallin'?
Where you gonna hide?

Why, tell me why 
Must we blow ourselves sky high? 

If Moscow and Washington live
You know Omaha won't survive

Paint Your Windows White begins with a British female news anchor talking about bomb shelters and warning people to put a coat over their head and, well, paint their windows white in the event of a nuclear war.

But several of the record's songs had more traditional Christian lyrical themes. You Are My Love was basically a love song to God. Look Up (His Coming is Near) was obviously a song about the Second Coming of Christ. By the way, Look Up fades out with a really nice analog synthesizer solo...such solos were still cool in the early 80s. And Alright By Me is a song that extols the character and attributes of the Lord Jesus. By the time the album is over, fear and paranoia have been replaced with faith, hope and love.

Malcolm & Alwyn

Malcolm Wild and Alwyn Wall grew up in England and performed together in a band called The Zodiacs prior to their conversion to Christianity. After becoming Christians, Malcolm and Alwyn were a "first wave" pioneering Jesus Music duo. Just think Simon and Garfunkel...except with a powerful anointing from the Holy Spirit. Their music was folk rock in the vein of Bob Dylan and certain Beatles songs; the lyrics were compelling, intelligent and pointed straight to Jesus. They released an all-time classic LP titled Fool's Wisdom in 1973 and followed that with another very solid collection called WildWall before going their separate ways. Post-Malcolm and Alwyn, they each formed bands and recorded solo projects before becoming full-time pastors in the Calvary Chapel movement.


Red Alert is the only full-length LP ever released by Malcolm and the Mirrors, and boasted one of the coolest covers ever. It featured a nuclear missile bursting through the screen of a coin-operated video game. It just doesn't get any more 80s than that. 

At times wildly aggressive and very different from Malcolm and Alwyn, this was full-on new wave and owes a great deal to The Knack and Andy McCarroll & Moral Support. On several songs, Wild half sings and half screams the lyrics, sounding more like Darrell Mansfield or Glenn Kaiser than he ever did when he was singing with his buddy Alwyn Wall.  Blogger David Lowman wrote, "Loud, fun and entirely British, there really are very few duds." Reviewer Gord Wilson points out, "This is one of those Maranatha discs that seem to be different on side A and B, and some people may think the new wave on the flip side is too subtle and restrained." True...but after having the living daylights scared out of us by Side One, the more relaxed tunes (in both tempo and lyric content) were a welcome and almost necessary change of pace!


During a recent wide-ranging interview with veteran radio host Jerry Bryant, Malcolm Wild describes how Red Alert came to be recorded in the first place: "I was now a part of the Maranatha Music Group. I was leading the Musicians' Fellowship there in California. And that led to them inviting me to form a band that we called Malcolm and the Mirrors, and we started to tour England. We would take bands and teams of people over from California and tour England, specifically in the schools. We had a marvelous opportunity to go into the schools and share the Lord there through the music. And so we wrote Red Alert. I wrote most of the songs on Red Alert for the specific reason of reaching the kids in the schools in England. That's how that album came about."

Malcolm Wild today

Still walking with Jesus, Malcolm Wild is senior pastor of Calvary Chapel in Merritt Island, Florida, imparting wisdom to others gained from a lifetime of following Jesus.