East of Underground

A pundit once described the American involvement in Vietnam as "the first rock & roll war," and East of Underground were a band whose story reflects some of the ways that notion played itself out. The United States Army has a long history of using music both as a recruitment tool and as a way to shore up morale among troops, and in the 1960s, as rock & roll and soul became the dominant popular music among young people, the Army's Entertainment Division began including more contemporary sounds in their programming. Off-duty soldiers enjoyed hearing modern sounds at enlisted men...