The Vietnam Reader (38 page)

October 1967. During a march on the Pentagon, a protester sticks a carnation in the barrel of a National Guardsman’s rifle.

Popular music has always had the ability to react immediately to historical events and sway the public. During previous American wars, sentimental and patriotic songs such as “Over There” and “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” cheered the troops and those left behind. After World War II, American music changed drastically, the big bands giving way to bop, hard bop, and the cool school. Rock ’n’ roll grew from a mix of blues, gospel, country, and boogie-woogie and quickly displaced the crooners of the war years. Possibly most important, the folk and Beat movements collided in coffeehouses and on campus, taking a cue from left-leaning songwriters like Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and Phil Ochs. By the mid-sixties, three major styles ruled popular music—folk, rock, and soul. Their voices were loud; as record-company earnings soared, artists’ celebrity grew, and so did their power to influence the mainstream media’s depiction of the war. A good example: in the early seventies, ex-Beatle John Lennon released two antiwar anthems with his Plastic Ono Band—”Christmas (War is Over)” and “Give Peace a Chance”; both are still sung today. By the war’s end in 1973, all three branches of popular music had made strong antiwar statements. Only country-western, which held sway in the conservative South and rural West, continued to offer prowar songs.

The single prowar song included here, “The Ballad of the Green Berets” by Special Forces Sgt. Barry Sadler, is something of an anomaly.
Its style is a stiff ballad, the lyrics mostly spoken over a lush and sentimental bed of instrumentation. Its success may be a good indication that people did support the war, if only because as a piece of music it’s ridiculously old-fashioned. In 1966 when it came out, The Beatles were well past
Rubber Soul
and into
Revolver.

The folk scene contributed protest songs from the late fifties on, its best-known artists Phil Ochs, Joan Baez, Odetta, and Bob Dylan before his notorious defection to the pop scene in 1965. After Dylan’s success, Buffalo Springfield and The Byrds combined folk and rock artfully, scoring a string of hits. Country Joe and the Fish’s “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die Rag” (1967) comes from a scruffier blend of the two, and became an anthem, along with the group’s “The Fish Cheer,” at Woodstock. The song’s jaunty gallows humor pokes fun at American foreign policy’s inability to come up with a clear and compelling goal in Vietnam.

Creedence Clearwater Revival’s lean, clean, bluesy sound earned them pop stardom. John Fogerty’s “Fortunate Son” (1969) takes on the common (and correct) perception that the rich and privileged weren’t serving in Vietnam but were all too happy to make others go.

Fronted by the legendary Jim Morrison, The Doors played literate acid-pop. “The Unknown Soldier” (1968) contrasts the anonymous death of a grunt with the material comfort and apathy of Americans back home and points up the uselessness of the war.

Motown, along with Stax/Volt the most influential African American labels, shied away from antiwar statements until late in the war. In 1971 Marvin Gaye had to fight to get “What’s Going On” released; it became a huge hit, as did a flood of other socially conscious tunes out of Motown, including Edwin Starr’s only hit “War” (1970), which has since been covered by any number of bands.

During the war, the pop and rock explosion that swept America kept a steady stream of hits with antiwar themes coming. Armed Forces Radio in-country played many of them; some, like The Animals’ “We Gotta Get Out of This Place”—whose lyrics were not actually about the war—were banned. Films dealing with the war often cram their soundtracks full of these tunes, most notably
Good Morning, Vietnam
and
Forrest Gump.

After 1973, there was no need for anti-Vietnam War songs, and few if any tracks about veterans were released. This changed with the dedication of the Wall. Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” (1984) became a rock anthem and was appropriated by both presidential candidates that year, even though its downbeat lyrics could be drawn from some typical hard-luck vet’s oral history. Other pop artists such as Charlie Daniels and Billy Joel also cashed in on America’s sudden sympathy for the vet.

10,000 Maniacs’ “The Big Parade” (1989) is a late entry, telling the story of one son’s journey to the Wall at the behest of his mother to commemorate his brother’s death. Like many of the later novels and memoirs, Natalie Merchant’s lyrics show the crowd at the Memorial and the different generations’ connections with the dead and the unsettled past.

The Ballad of the Green Berets
B
ARRY
S
ADLER
AND
R
OBIN
M
OORE
1966

Fighting soldiers from the sky,
Fearless men who jump and die.
Men who mean just what they say,
The brave men of The Green Beret.

Silver wings upon their chests,
These are men, America’s best.
One hundred men we’ll test today,
But only three win The Green Beret.

Trained to live off nature’s land,
Trained to combat, hand to hand.
Men who fight by night and day,
Courage take from The Green Beret.

Silver wings upon their chests,
These are men, America’s best.
One hundred men we’ll test today,
But only three win The Green Beret.

Back at home a young wife waits
Her Green Beret has met his fate.
He has died for those oppressed,
Leaving her his last request.

Put silver wings on my son’s chest,
Make him one of America’s best.
He’ll be a man they’ll test one day.
Have him win The Green Beret.

I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die Rag
C
OUNTRY
J
OE
M
C
D
ONALD
1965

Come on all of you big strong men,
Uncle Sam needs your help again;
He’s got himself in a terrible jam
Way down yonder in Viet Nam;
So put down your books and pick up a gun,
We’re gonna have a whole lot of fun!

Chorus:

And it’s one two three,
What are we fighting for?
Don’t ask me, I don’t give a damn,
Next stop is Vietnam.
And it’s five six seven,
Open up the Pearly Gates;
There ain’t no time to wonder why,
Whoopie—we’re all gonna die!

Come on, generals, let’s move fast,
Your big chance has come at last;
Now you can go out and get those Reds,
The only good Commie is one that’s dead;
You know that peace can only be won,
When we’ve blown ’em all to kingdom come!

(Chorus)

Come on, Wall Street, don’t be slow,
Why, man, this is war Au-go-go;
There’s plenty good money to be made,
Supplying the army with tools of the trade;
Just hope and pray if they drop the Bomb,
They drop it on the Viet Cong!

(Chorus)

Come on, mothers, throughout the land,
Pack your boys off to Vietnam;
Come on, fathers, don’t hesitate,
Send your sons off before it’s too late;
You can be the first one on your block
To have your boy come home in a box.

(Chorus)

Fortunate Son
C
REEDENCE
C
LEARWATER
R
EVIVAL
/ J
OHN
F
OGERTY
1969

Some folks are born made to wave the flag;
ooh, they’re red, white and blue.

And when the band plays “Hail to the chief,”
they point the cannon right at you.

It ain’t me, it ain’t me—I ain’t no senator’s son.
It ain’t me, it ain’t me;—I ain’t no fortunate one. one. one.

Some folks are born, silver spoon in hand;
Lord, don’t they help themselves.

But when the tax man comes to the door,
Lord, the house looks like a rummage sale.

It ain’t me, it ain’t me—I ain’t no millionaire’s son.
It ain’t me, it ain’t me;—I ain’t no fortunate one. one. one.

Some folks inherit star spangled eyes;
ooh, they send you down to war.

And when you ask them, “How much should we give?”
they only answer More! more! more!

It ain’t me, it ain’t me—I ain’t no military son.
It ain’t me, it ain’t me;—I ain’t no fortunate one. one. one.

The Unknown Soldier
T
HE
D
OORS
/J
IM
M
ORRISON
1968

Wait until the war is over
and we’re both a little older
The unknown soldier

Breakfast where the news is read
television children fed
unborn living, living dead
bullet strikes the helmet’s head
and it’s all over for the unknown soldier
it’s all over for the unknown soldier

(barked out): Hup two three four
                     Company, halt.
                     Present arms.

Make a grave for the unknown soldier
nestled in your hollow shoulder
the unknown soldier

Breakfast where the news is read
television children fed
bullet strikes the helmet’s head
and it’s all over
the war is over
it’s all over
war is over
it’s all over
all over
all over
all over

What’s Going On
M
ARVIN
G
AYE
1971

(background talk: What’s happening? Solid. Right on, etc.)

Mother, mother, there’s too many of you crying.
Brother, brother, brother, there’s far too many of you dying.
You know, we’ve got to find a way
to bring some loving here today.