The Last Press Conference

Annotation

A largely spoken word release, with musical background (Flying Dutchman # FDS-127) in which Rosko narrated the newspaper articles of Pete Hamill - an American journalist who in the 1960s wrote for the New York Post, reporting from Vietnam.1 It took a highly critical view of the Vietnam War, the military, and the politicians of the era, such as President Eisenhower and President Nixon. Produced by Bob Thiele, founder of Flying Dutchman, it featured background music from Ron Carter (bass) and James Spaulding (flute). Nat Hentoff, music critic and historian, wrote the linear notes to the record. Hamill also wrote the words for the 1970 record Massacre at My Lai (Flying Dutchman # FDS-118). On the front cover appeared a painting of John Filo's photograph of Mary Ann Vecchio kneeling next to Jeffrey Miller's body. Billboard wrote an article about the album on 6 June 1970, reporting that "Bob Thiele's Fluing Dutchman label is releasing...a documentary album compiled from the columns of New York Post writer, Pete Hamill. This is the fourth album in a series of social comment LP's....Said Thiele: 'I also have tape of the Richard Nixon remark about 'student bums' and some comments by Vice President Agnew, including the 'intellectual snobs' remark. I think the new album is the most provocative of all - it show the gap between the administration and the young people today'".2 One of those other albums was A Night at Santa Rita (Flying Dutchman # FDS-111), about the People's Park protest at the University of California in Berkeley in May 1969, from the perspective of the journalist Robert Scheer. So Hamill sought to establish the general context of the protests throughout the US, such as the Cambodia invasion and the history of the Vietnam War. The track "The Last Press Conference" started by quoting Richard Nixon, talking about the war as the Vice-President on 16 April 1954: "If to avoid communist expansion in Asia and Indochina...we must put our boys in, I think the executive...has to do". Hamill then noted "There are four dead Americans at the campus of Kent State University, gunned down by other Americans...from Indochina we hear news...of moving into Cambodia. Burning, and shooting, and destroying". In the track "The Army of the Young", Hamill focused on the aftermath of a demonstration in Washington, in which the young had all gone home, with their "style, energy, sweetness, outrage, and courage". He condemned the Washington political elite, and said that the Capitol had "sold itself to the lies and crimes of old men".Sources1Pete Hamill: Biography↩2Billboard, 6 June 1970↩

Annotation by Justin A. Brummer

Annotation — Kent / Jackson State Songs

A spoken word release (Flying Dutchman # FDS-127) in which Rosko narrated the newspaper articles of Pete Hamill - an American journalist who in the 1960s wrote for the New York Post, reporting from Vietnam.1 It took a highly critical view of the Vietnam War, the military, and the politicians of the era, such as President Eisenhower and President Nixon. Produced by Bob Thiele, founder of Flying Dutchman, it featured background music from Ron Carter (bass) and James Spaulding (flute). Nat Hentoff, music critic and historian, wrote the linear notes to the record. Hamill also wrote the words for the 1970 record Massacre at My Lai (Flying Dutchman # FDS-118). On the front cover appeared a painting of John Filo's photograph of Mary Ann Vecchio kneeling next to Jeffrey Miller's body. Billboard wrote an article about the album on 6 June 1970, reporting that "Bob Thiele's Fluing Dutchman label is releasing...a documentary album compiled from the columns of New York Post writer, Pete Hamill. This is the fourth album in a series of social comment LP's....Said Thiele: 'I also have tape of the Richard Nixon remark about 'student bums' and some comments by Vice President Agnew, including the 'intellectual snobs' remark. I think the new album is the most provocative of all - it show the gap between the administration and the young people today'".2 One of those other albums was A Night at Santa Rita (Flying Dutchman # FDS-111), about the People's Park protest at the University of California in Berkeley in May 1969, from the perspective of the journalist Robert Scheer. So Hamill sought to establish the general context of the protests throughout the US, such as the Cambodia invasion and the history of the Vietnam War. The track "The Last Press Conference" started by quoting Richard Nixon, talking about the war as the Vice-President on 16 April 1954: "If to avoid communist expansion in Asia and Indochina...we must put our boys in, I think the executive...has to do". Hamill then noted "There are four dead Americans at the campus of Kent State University, gunned down by other Americans...from Indochina we hear news...of moving into Cambodia. Burning, and shooting, and destroying". In the track "The Army of the Young", Hamill focused on the aftermath of a demonstration in Washington, in which the young had all gone home, with their "style, energy, sweetness, outrage, and courage". He condemned the Washington political elite, and said that the Capitol had "sold itself to the lies and crimes of old men".Sources1Pete Hamill: Biography↩2Billboard, 6 June 1970↩

Annotation by Justin A. Brummer

Lyrics

English: There is still a taste of tear gas in the air / But the weekend is now over / The army of the young has gone home, taking with it, its style, energy, sweetness, outrage, and courage / It might never come back... / They came screaming into town early on Friday and by Saturday / There were thousands of them... / Invading the privileged sanctuaries of the old... / Washington has always seemed a dull...town filled with grey bureaucrats... / But on this weekend it seemed something far worse / Now it feels like a town whose confidence has cracked / The capitol of a nation...has sold itself to the lies and crimes of old men There it was on television, that makes it true doesn't it / I mean if they say it on television it has to be right... / But it can't be right, nobody would shoot on a campus... / Kids in the National Guard are just kids who aren't in Vietnam / They're not different, they're not shoot-em-uppers... / Maybe if I close my eyes I will think I heard wrong / I close my eyes, four children still are dead / Four mothers now must learn to teach a child to say please and thank you is no longer enough / Children now must learn that bullets kill and when the National Guard shoots, you have to duck / Four father are not fathers anymore... / In this, a world of mourning, I weep for the children that died and for the children that killed them

About the artist

Spoken-word recordings written and produced by New York Post columnist Pete Hamill (born 24 June 1935, Brooklyn, New York; died 5 August 2020, Brooklyn), narrated by New York radio DJ William 'Rosko' Mercer, with jazz backing - including Massacre at My Lai (Flying Dutchman, 1969) and Murder at Kent State University (1970). [Source: Wikipedia; Discogs]

Themes

Kent State · Anti-War

In collections

Jazz Songs · Kent / Jackson State Songs · Peace, Protest, & Anti-War Songs [War Years]