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Mark Mccord

Good Morning Vietnam: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack 
Various artists
A&M
Music is, in the lexicon of the marketing industry, "sticky" - that means a song can stay with the listener for a long time, associated with - or stuck to - memories of whatever we were doing when we heard it.
Since discovering this, crafty marketing people have hooked their products to great songs in movies and TV ads, and the list of wonderful music that has been devalued in such a way is depressingly long.
Also, in the pursuit of making an impact, directors weld songs to key scenes to give their films a kick.
In particular, the Vietnam war has appropriated, via Hollywood, a welter of rock songs because of filmmakers' penchant for soundtracking films with contemporary music.
Unfortunately, these movies have tended towards clod-hopping macho-fests and the music used in them has suffered as a result.
Even songs used properly in good films centred on the war, such as The Doors' The End in Apocalypse Now, carry that cringe-inducing baggage with them. For every The Deer Hunter  there are 10 Rambos. Sadly, all songs used in them go into the same tub and come out smelling of movie-maker desperation.
The lukewarm black comedy Good Morning Vietnam was neither a macho nor psychologically probing movie, but it probably pulled more songs into the 'Nam morass than any other.
From sweet soul to bubblegum pop, the 1987 movie starring Robin Williams as army DJ Adrian Cronauer sent to entertain the troops, used a raft of classics from the 1960s to punctuate its often limp narrative.
Many, however, were caught in snatches as Cronauer either ended one track during a fade-in or began another at the fade-out.
The Beach Boys were apparently a favourite of the GIs at the time as the soundtrack featured two of their songs: the upbeat hit I Get Around and the lesser-known down-tempo The Warmth of the Sun.
James Brown's I Got You (I Feel Good) was used to good effect in the trailer and went on to feature in dozens of other films, including Dr Dolittle and Transformers.
The song most readily identified with Good Morning Vietnam, however, is Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World, whose sweet melody and optimistic sentiment is juxtaposed with images of attack helicopters swooping on villages and GIs brutally arresting suspected communist conspirators.
A movie can enhance the power of a song and Vietnam war films have managed that - Jefferson Airplane's  White Rabbit in Platoon springs to mind - but often their use has been clumsy or gratuitous.
Either way, it's hard not to think a conflict that left more than three million Vietnamese dead deserves a soundtrack a little more befitting the tragedy of the era.
Charlie Carter


Rewind, album: 'Good Morning Vietnam, Original Motion Picture Soundtrack'

Lifestyle

Arts

Music is, in the lexicon of the marketing industry, "sticky" - that means a song can stay with the listener for a long time, associated with - or stuck to - memories of whatever we were doing when we heard it.
