About the project › Scope & context
Scope & context
What counts as a Vietnam War song, the historical background the archive works within, and how the collection is organised.
IntroductionHistorical ContextSong CriteriaStructure
Introduction
"The Vietnam Conflict Spawning Heavy Barrage of Disk Tunes" the headline read in Billboard on 4 June 1966. It went on to report that:Many of these American songs divided into two familiar camps, reflecting US politics at the time: the patriotic song, particularly seen in the country music market, and the protest song, aimed at the younger folk / rock music market. However, a closer look at the 1000s of Vietnam War related songs shows that many other sub-divisions existed between these two camps, such as songs which displayed sympathy for those fighting and for those on the home front. Some songs looked at specific episodes and issues, such as the Kent State demonstrations, the My Lai massacre, the situation of P.O.W.s, and the use of agent orange and napalm.
Hundreds of songs also came out of other countries, often overlooked in favour of a US-centric view - such as from Sweden, France, the UK, Germany, Vietnam, New Zealand, Australia, and various countries in South America. This follows in a long tradition of event and political songs, such as songs about the Great War, the 1930s Depression, the Second World War, as well as the conflict in Korea, and the Civil Rights movement. Vietnam War songs, through its musical styles and lyrical content, are an interesting contemporary reflection of society and culture.
Quote
"since January, well over 100 Vietnam records have been released, with five making the Billboard Hot 100 and a dozen making Billboard's country charts....With Vietnam still the over-riding issue, and with little likelihood for an early settlement, the prospect for more war songs is certain". (1)Hundreds of songs also came out of other countries, often overlooked in favour of a US-centric view - such as from Sweden, France, the UK, Germany, Vietnam, New Zealand, Australia, and various countries in South America. This follows in a long tradition of event and political songs, such as songs about the Great War, the 1930s Depression, the Second World War, as well as the conflict in Korea, and the Civil Rights movement. Vietnam War songs, through its musical styles and lyrical content, are an interesting contemporary reflection of society and culture.
Historical Context
Despite President Franklin D. Roosevelt war time opposition to colonialism and a reestablishment of French Indochina, in 1945-46 his successor President Harry S. Truman accepted the French return to Indochina, and actively aided the French war effort from 1950. (2) President Dwight D. Eisenhower in the late 1950s attached American credibility, financial backing, and a limited military commitment to protect an independent, non-communist South Vietnam (with around 900 advisers). Under President John F. Kennedy this started to rise drastically - US military personnel in South Vietnam rose to 3,205 by 31 December 1961. By 31 December 1962, total personnel reached 11,300. Thus, the number tripled between 1960 and 1962, receiving more coverage in the media and greater attention from the public. On 7 August 1964, the US Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, following a naval clash between North Vietnam and US forces, which permitted President Lyndon B. Johnson to send conventional forces to Vietnam. This led to a major escalation of US military personal, reaching over 500,000.
This peaked in the first months of President Richard Nixon's administration, reaching 543,400 by April 1969. But then he implemented a strategy of "Vietnamisation" - the gradual withdrawal of American forces and the strengthening of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), an element of the Nixon "Guam" Doctrine, announced to reporters at Guam on 25 July 1969. Nixon ran down the number of US troops in East Asia from 746,901 in 1969 to 141,956 in 1974. Nixon’s strategy also involved the expansion of the war into Cambodia (April 1970) and Laos (February 1971), and extensive bombing campaigns throughout Indochina (for example, the 'Christmas Bombings' of 1972 on Hanoi and Haiphong).
On the diplomatic front, secret negotiations began between Henry Kissinger (US National Security Adviser 1969-75 and Secretary of State 1973-77) and his North Vietnamese counterpart, Le Duc Tho, in Paris in 1969. The Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam was signed at the International Conference Centre in Paris on 27 January 1973. (3) On 29 April 1975, South Vietnam collapsed. North and South were united, and Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City.
Song Criteria
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- Pre-Gulf of Tonkin: 1960-1964
While many of these early US songs may have been intending to refer to US troops in Germany, or Korea, or representing general Cold War fears, they were released in the run-up to the "Vietnam era" and the Gulf of Tonkin incident (1964), which led to a major escalation of US involvement in the conflict, and thus included in this list, as cultural perspectives. The criteria is the same as for the war years - the songs included mention Vietnam, or the lyrics deal with war-related themes, such as combat, the US draft, weapons such as napalm, prisoners of war, demonstrations, references to soldiers and veterans, war & peace, and expressions of patriotism. - War Years: 1964-1975
Released during the key war years, the songs included mention Vietnam, or the lyrics deal with war-related themes, such as combat, the US draft, weapons such as napalm, prisoners of war, demonstrations, references to soldiers and veterans, war & peace, and expressions of patriotism.
While the war goes back to the 1954 Geneva conference, following the Gulf of Tonkin incident (1964), the US significantly expanded its presence in the region and its defence of South Vietnam, and thus using this date as the beginning of the core war years. These run to the collapse of South Vietnam (30 April 1975), in two periods: (a) 1964-1972, the years of major US combat involvement, up to the peace agreement; (b) 1973-1975, from the Paris Peace Accords (27 January 1973), which brought US troops and prisoners of war home, to the collapse of South Vietnam. - Post-War: 1976-present
Themes especially found in the post-Vietnam War era are lyrics about post-traumatic stress disorder, prisoners of war and the missing in action, the plight and treatment of veterans, and agent orange, in the years after the collapse of South Vietnam and the unification of North and South Vietnam.
Structure
The archive is organised in two ways at once: by what a song is about, and by when and where it was made. Every record has a page of its own, and every record can be reached from several directions. Songs are cross-referenced throughout, so a record may appear in more than one collection and under more than one theme.
Record pages. One entry per song — a two-sided single with two relevant songs becomes two entries. Each page carries the artist and title as credited, the release it comes from, label and catalogue number, date, place, format, release type, language, genre and whether the recording is an original, a cover or an alternative version. Below that sit the lyric content themes the words carry, a written annotation where one exists, quotations from the lyrics (non-English songs with the original words and an English translation side by side), label scans and picture sleeves, and the recording on YouTube where it is online. Unless another collection is named under a picture, scans are from the collection of the editor, Justin A. Brummer, PhD. Every page ends with a citation line and a SongID, which is stable and will still find the record as the archive grows.
Browse the archive holds every record with filters down the left: lyric theme and sub-theme, decade and year, era, region and country, US state, genre and sub-genre, release type, format, language, original or cover, prominence, label, city and artist. Ticking more than one value in the same filter widens the results; ticking values in different filters narrows them, and every count updates as you go. Records whose date is not yet established are kept together under “Unknown date” rather than guessed at, and archival releases — recorded during the war but issued later — are dated by release with the recording date noted.
Directories. Themes is the lyric content taxonomy: parent themes and their sub-themes, each with a definition. Places, Genres and Artists gather the archive by country and region, by musical style and by performer; Songwriters does the same for the people credited with writing the songs.
Collections are the project’s annotated lists, begun on Rate Your Music in 2007 and rebuilt here with an introduction, pictures, notes by period and a chronological run of numbered entries. They are grouped as:
(a) Core categories: peace, protest and anti-war; US ‘patriotic’ / pro-government / anti-protest; US military and veteran; North Vietnamese; US combat perspective; US domestic perspective.
(b) Key events: the 1968 Chicago Seven / Eight; Kent and Jackson State; My Lai and Lt. William Calley; Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers.
(c) Other themes: the draft; Christmas; Civil Rights; P.O.W. / M.I.A.; children on record; the Veterans Memorial Wall; answer and response records; Jody; napalm and Agent Orange; the silent majority, and others.
(d) Genres: garage rock, blues, punk, metal, polka, song poems, rap and hip hop, soul, gospel and funk, jazz, country, and spoken word.
(e) Regional and cultural groups: Australia and New Zealand; Europe; Latin, Central American and Caribbean music; Mexican-American / Hispanic; Puerto Rican; Japanese; Indigenous Americans.
(f) Artists: single-artist collections, beginning with Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger and Bruce Springsteen.
Record pages. One entry per song — a two-sided single with two relevant songs becomes two entries. Each page carries the artist and title as credited, the release it comes from, label and catalogue number, date, place, format, release type, language, genre and whether the recording is an original, a cover or an alternative version. Below that sit the lyric content themes the words carry, a written annotation where one exists, quotations from the lyrics (non-English songs with the original words and an English translation side by side), label scans and picture sleeves, and the recording on YouTube where it is online. Unless another collection is named under a picture, scans are from the collection of the editor, Justin A. Brummer, PhD. Every page ends with a citation line and a SongID, which is stable and will still find the record as the archive grows.
Browse the archive holds every record with filters down the left: lyric theme and sub-theme, decade and year, era, region and country, US state, genre and sub-genre, release type, format, language, original or cover, prominence, label, city and artist. Ticking more than one value in the same filter widens the results; ticking values in different filters narrows them, and every count updates as you go. Records whose date is not yet established are kept together under “Unknown date” rather than guessed at, and archival releases — recorded during the war but issued later — are dated by release with the recording date noted.
Directories. Themes is the lyric content taxonomy: parent themes and their sub-themes, each with a definition. Places, Genres and Artists gather the archive by country and region, by musical style and by performer; Songwriters does the same for the people credited with writing the songs.
Collections are the project’s annotated lists, begun on Rate Your Music in 2007 and rebuilt here with an introduction, pictures, notes by period and a chronological run of numbered entries. They are grouped as:
(a) Core categories: peace, protest and anti-war; US ‘patriotic’ / pro-government / anti-protest; US military and veteran; North Vietnamese; US combat perspective; US domestic perspective.
(b) Key events: the 1968 Chicago Seven / Eight; Kent and Jackson State; My Lai and Lt. William Calley; Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers.
(c) Other themes: the draft; Christmas; Civil Rights; P.O.W. / M.I.A.; children on record; the Veterans Memorial Wall; answer and response records; Jody; napalm and Agent Orange; the silent majority, and others.
(d) Genres: garage rock, blues, punk, metal, polka, song poems, rap and hip hop, soul, gospel and funk, jazz, country, and spoken word.
(e) Regional and cultural groups: Australia and New Zealand; Europe; Latin, Central American and Caribbean music; Mexican-American / Hispanic; Puerto Rican; Japanese; Indigenous Americans.
(f) Artists: single-artist collections, beginning with Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger and Bruce Springsteen.