P.O.W.

Annotation — P.O.W. / M.I.A. Songs

Another country music, Vietnam related album by the Lonesome Valley Singers - in addition to Hello Vietnam: Country & Western War Songs (1965) and Men in the Green Berets (1966) - all released on the New Jersey based label Diplomat Records - part of the SPC (Synthetic Plastics Company), established in 1920s, a plastics company that produced budget music albums (usually sold for around 99¢).1 This album included the song "P.O.W." (Diplomatic # DS-2489). Narrated from the perspective a P.O.W., held for "three long and lonely years", he wondered why the war continued. He then went on to call for the indiscriminate bombing of Vietnam, to cause a lot of harm, and thus force the North Vietnamese into surrendering: "why not let the bombs fall where they may and let the enemy know we mean it". Sources1Billboard, 27 January 1962↩

Annotation by Justin A. Brummer

Annotation — US 'Patriotic' / Pro-Government / Anti-Protest Songs

Another country music, Vietnam related album by the Lonesome Valley Singers - in addition to Hello Vietnam: Country & Western War Songs (1965) and Men in the Green Berets (1966) - all released on the New Jersey based label Diplomat Records - part of the SPC (Synthetic Plastics Company), established in 1920s, a plastics company that produced budget music albums (usually sold for around 99¢).1 This album included the song "P.O.W." (Diplomatic # DS-2489). Narrated from the perspective a P.O.W., held for "three long and lonely years", he wondered why the war continued. He then went on to call for the indiscriminate bombing of Vietnam, to cause a lot of harm, and thus force the North Vietnamese into surrendering: "why not let the bombs fall where they may and let the enemy know we mean it".Sources1Billboard, 27 January 1962↩

Annotation by Justin A. Brummer

Lyrics

English: I've been a prisoner of war for three long and lonely years / And it seems I may never see a day when there's victory / All of us have had bad treatment / We aren't being tortured at all but still, I like to be free / Because waiting is slowly killing me... / We don't understand what we've heard about the way the war goes on / The war could have been stopped long ago but we continue to move so slow... / Why not let the bombs fall where they may and let the enemy know we mean it / They might not let me out for what I say / But all the soldiers can go home to stay

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. [Source: Discogs]

Themes

Patriotic · Soldier's Perspective · P.O.W.

In collections

P.O.W. / M.I.A. Songs · US 'Patriotic' / Pro-Government / Anti-Protest Songs [War Years]