"Reap" is the first single from The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus' third album,
Am I the Enemy?, released in 2011. It marked a new chapter for the band, which had left Virgin Records and was now independent. They had Christian themes in their earlier songs, and their breakout hit "
Face Down" went to #1 on the Christian Rock chart, but "Reap" is more obviously biblical, with "reap just what you sow" originating with a passage in Galatians 6:7-8:
For whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.Vocalist Ronnie Winter co-wrote the song with the producer of Am I the Enemy?, John Feldmann. "It's the first time we've ever done that, we didn't do any co-writing with Howard [Benson] or Dave Bendith," Winter told Alternative Addiction. "A lot of bands are doing that these days, you just feel closer as a team when you are in the studio trying to make a great record."
Regarding the song's meaning, Winter said it's a personal anthem about the road the band have chosen. "It's just basically a reflection of us as a band saying that we made the right decision to take the hard route and stick to our integrity instead of being a sell out," he told Alternative Addiction. "Just about believing in your own abilities and being happy knowing that it's worth the hard work in the end."
Winter explained to Artist Direct how he teamed up with John Feldmann. Said the RJA frontman: "I've never covered a song in our career as Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. I've always written the lyrics and melodies. However, I was approached with idea of writing with someone. I didn't want to write with just any Joe Shmoe who didn't know our music or care about what we do. At least, that was my idea of how it worked. Granted, I'd never done it before so I didn't really know what I was talking about [Laughs].
I was given a list of people who were available at the time, and I saw John Feldmann's name on it. He's one of my all-time favorite lead singers. GoldFinger was a huge band for me and everybody in the southeast back in '98 and '99. When I was in high school, GoldFinger, blink-182, NOFX, and MXPX were my heroes. Seeing John's name on the list, I was like, 'Hell yeah, I want to write with him. He's my number one choice!' We contacted him, and he was down. We met up and on the first every day we sat in his kitchen in the Hollywood Hills. I was on a natural high being able to meet the guy and hang with him on a chill level. Most people have to meet their favorite artists by waiting in line at a signing [Laughs].
We sat around and talked about everything that we had gone through in the past couple of years, where my head was musically, things I was into at the time, and 'Reap' was the very first song that we wrote together right there in his kitchen. We both expressed how cool we thought it was so we turned around and wrote another song the very next day. He was like, 'Why don't you come back tomorrow and we'll try another one?' We wrote 'Salvation,' and the same thing happened. We vibed and gelled right away. Then, we recorded two demos.
Sitting in the mixing room, we knew we had something really good going. I just thought, 'What the hell? I'm going to ask him.' I said, 'Dude, let's just make a record together! Look at what we did in two days!' He thought about it for two or three minutes and replied, 'Let's do it.' It went from songwriting to making a record together."
Winter explained the song's lyrics to Artist Direct: "It's a mixture of two different perceptions. Looking at the world, there is so much crazy stuff going on. Everybody is aware of the issues in the Middle East and all of the upheaval overt here. People are starting to figure out that they're being treated horribly by their government and democracy and freedom is a much better way to allow people to live. It doesn't take a politician to tell you that living under oppression is crappy for anybody. With all of that energy floating around over there, these world leaders are reaping what they sow. They've been controlling these people, information, media, and strangling their own people. Now, they're uprising against them. Part of the song is about that.
Part of it is also expressing the fact that when we left our label we know we made the right decision because we felt like we were being oppressed and shaped into something that we didn't like and didn't want to be. Instead of trading our soul, we said, 'No, we're going to stay true to ourselves.' A lot of people told us it was the wrong decision. We left them; they didn't leave us."
