Paul Hardcastle

Homepage
Sitemap
Biorhythms
Moon Phases
Civilization
Rebecca

Paul Hardcastle

Paul Hardcastle is a British synth player. He was born December 10, 1958. Paul enjoyed success on the underground dance scene in the early 80s before breaking into the mainstream with "19", an international smash which spent five weeks at number one in the UK. In the latter half of the 1980s he specialised in TV soundtrack work, and now records mainly under the pseudonym Jazzmasters.

"19" was an interesting combination of preachy spoken word, testimonials, looping news reports, synths and heavy beats, concerning a subject that dominated music two decades earlier: the Vietnam War. The number nineteen was significant in the song as the reported "average age" of the combat soldier during the conflict.

While those of us who were of high school age (or there-abouts) at the time were not terribly concerned with the political fallout that surrounded the Vietnam war, there was so little popular music with socio-political messages in 1985 that we really latched on to it. Plus for some reason it felt really cool to repeat the line "I wasn't really sure what was going on."

Hundreds of thousands of men who saw heavy combat in Vietnam have been arrested since discharge. Their arrest rate is almost twice that of non-veterans of the same age. There are no accurate figures of how many of these men have been incarcerated. But, a Veterans Administration study concludes that the greater the Vets exposure to combat the more likely his chances of being arrested or convicted.

After World War II the Men came home together on troop ships, but the Vietnam Vet often arrived home within 48 hours of jungle combat. Perhaps the most dramatic difference between World War II and Vietnam was coming home... none of them received a hero's welcome.

This is one legacy of the Vietnam War

Click on the following link to read the Lyrics to '19': Lyrics to '19'