Terry Allen/Original Soundtrack - Amerasia: A Film by Wolf-Eckart Buhler

Since his recording debut in 1975, Allen has always been considered an irreverent, ironic maverick of country music and this was perhaps his most unusual project. The album was originally a film soundtrack when first released in 1987, both the film and Allen's specially written songs a view of the aftermath of the USA's use of Thailand as a 'rest and recuperation' area for G.I.'s in Vietnam. Recorded in Bangkok, Thailand with a combination of some of his regular musicians and a Laotian band, the resulting 17 song cycle is sometimes beautiful and sometimes jarring and creepy. But despite the anger and damage described on this record it ends with Allen's version of hope, Let Freedom Ring, a version of My Country Tis Of Thee that is turned on its head to become a folk song about common blood and friendship.