By Thomas Madison
From Powdered Wig reader, Max von Solow. Awesome a cappella version of God Bless The USA, by Lee Greenwood and the Army Chorus, sung impromptu in the tunnel at Nats Park after Greenwood’s performance at the 2015 Winter Classic. I never realized the song is 31 years old. Thanks, Max!
From wikipedia: “God Bless the USA” is an American patriotic song written and recorded by country music artist Lee Greenwood, and is considered to be his signature song. The first album it appears on is 1984’s You’ve Got a Good Love Comin’. It reached No. 7 on the Billboard magazine Hot Country Singles chart when originally released in the spring of 1984, and was played at the 1984 Republican National Convention with President Ronald Reagan and first lady Nancy Reagan in attendance, but the song gained greater prominence during the Gulf War in 1990 and 1991, as a way of boosting morale.
The popularity of the song rose sharply after the September 11 attacks and during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and the song was re-released as a single, re-entering the country music charts at No. 16 and peaking at No. 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart in 2001.[2] The song was also re-recorded in 2003 and released as “God Bless the USA 2003”. The song also rose up in popularity in May 2011 when Osama bin Laden was killed by an American raid in Pakistan.[3] Greenwood also wrote a Canadian version of this song called “God Bless You Canada”.[4] The song has sold over a million copies in the United States by July 2015.”[5]
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Background and writing[edit]
Greenwood said that he “wanted to write it my whole life. When I got to that point, we were doing 300 days a year on the road, and we were on our fourth or fifth album on MCA. I called my producer, and I said I have a need to do this. I’ve always wanted to write a song about America, and I said we just need to be more united.”[6]
