iPod song of the week – Paul Hardcastle
Despite my joking about Memorial Day, I am eternally grateful for the sacrifices made by others for the freedoms we enjoy today. I’m also grateful for great music about said wartime sacrifices. I once did a paper in college about songs dealing with the Vietnam War that came out after the actual war. As you can imagine, it was among the more fun projects I did in college (speaking of, please note that Hopkins made it to the Division I Lacrosse Finals this weekend – go Lax Scholarship Guys!). There were several great songs from my project which I could have chosen for the iPod Song of the Week: REM’s Orange Crush, The Clash’s Straight to Hell, The Minutemen’s Viet Nam, but strangely, this one is my favorite.
First off, this guy isn’t even American, he’s British. Second of all, the song is predominantly made up of sound bites from a TV documentary about the war, used to great effect. I have no idea why a disco beat, background screams, and lady soul singers bring home the horrors of this war, but somehow they do. Obviously, the central point of the song is how young the soldiers were (thus the title), the horrific nature of their experiences, their inability to adjust once they came back, and the lack of appreciation for their efforts. But Paul Hardcastle appreciated you, guys! And he put out this unique single in 1985 before disappearing off the face of the earth.
And the title lives on in the name of the company which brings us American Idol, 19 Management. Yes, Simon Fuller was Paul Hardcastle’s manager. Remember that the next time you’re playing Trivial Pursuit.
Paul Hardcastle – 19
Not available on Napster, but is on about 500 different 80’s collections. You can stream it on the iSotW page.
