When The Cruel Sea reunited last year for their first concerts in a decade, they were also busy creating new music.
Now, the award-winning Sydney rock band has announced their first album in over twenty years, Straight Into the Sun, along with its lead single and title track.
This marks a strong return for the influential band, with frontman Tex Perkins sharing that the album draws inspiration from their early work. Ideas for the new album began to take shape in 2023 when the band came together to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their classic 1993 release, The Honeymoon Is Over.
Performing to sold-out crowds across Australia, this reunion led to recording sessions that produced ten tracks for Straight Into the Sun.
“It owed a bit to that surf-instrumental vibe,” he told Double J, “rather than where we ended up with things like Better Get A Lawyer, which is weird, grungy … with slide guitars.”
Perkins aimed to create an album that focuses on guitar-driven sounds and the balladeering nature of The Cruel Sea, rather than their hard rock or funky side. The band originally released two albums, Down Below (1989) and This Is Not the Way Home (1991), before bringing in Perkins as their lead vocalist.
Straight Into the Sun follows their first studio release since 2001’s Where’s the Smoke. Their third album, The Honeymoon Is Over, released in May 1993, peaked at number four on the ARIA Albums Chart. The following year, the band swept the ARIA Awards, winning Single of the Year and Album of the Year, among other honours.
Straight Into the Sun is set to arrive on March 7th, 2025. The album will be available in various vinyl formats, as well as in physical CD and on digital platforms.
The Cruel Sea’s tour supporting Cold Chisel kicked off this weekend in Armidale, NSW, and continues into December.
The Cruel Sea’s “Straight Into the Sun” is out now, and you can pre-save or pre-order the new album here.
