Goodbye Curly Head
1965 · Diplomat D 2376 · USA
- Artist
- The Lonesome Valley Singers
- Title
- Goodbye Curly Head
- Release
- Hello Vietnam: Country & Western War Songs
- Year
- 1965
- Label
- Diplomat # D 2376
- Format
- LP · Album
- Language
- English
- Country
- USA
- Genre
- Country · Country
- Primary theme
- US 'Patriotic' / Pro-Government / Anti-Protest Songs
Annotation — US 'Patriotic' / Pro-Government / Anti-Protest Songs
The country group The Lonesome Valley Singers produced a whole album in support of the soldiers fighting in South East Asia (Diplomat Records # D 2376). They also released two other Vietnam themed albums, discussed below - Men in the Green Berets (1966) and God Bless the Working Man. This album included a version of two Tom T. Hall songs discussed above - the track "Hello Vietnam" (made famous by Johnnie Wright) and "What We're Fighting For" (released by Dave Dudley and others). The track "It's All Worth Fighting For" looked at the objectives of the war. The lyrics propagated the "domino theory" - that the collapse of South Vietnam into the control of the communist north would trigger the collapse of democracy in other countries and threaten the US - the idea of which came from President Eisenhower, during a press conferences on 7 April 1974. (1) The group sung that if the US "give Vietnam to the enemy", then there would be "no stopping" them. Thus, the US needed to "call a halt to this transgression". The end of the song compared Vietnam to the Second World War and Korea, as examples of worthy conflicts: "World War Two and Korea...it's all worth fighting for".
Annotation by Justin A. Brummer
About the artist
Anonymous budget-label studio group that recorded for Diplomat Records; Discogs links the name to aliases including Tex Johnson & His Six Shooters, Billy Bond and The Badmen. No formation, location or membership details stated in verified sources. [Source: Discogs]