The Big Parade

250. The song "The Big Parade" by 10,000 Maniacs was written as a collaboration. The music was by drummer Jerome Augustyniak, and the lyrics by lead singer Natalie Merchant. It is a narrative song about a mother’s request that her son, Tommy, travel from Detroit to Washington D.C. to take letters that were written to her from her husband who was killed during the war.  

“Reading all his mother's mail from a city boy in a jungle town postmarked Saigon. 
He'll go live his mother's dream; join the slowest parade he'll ever see. 
Her weight of sorrows carried long and carried far. 
"Take these, Tommy, to The Wall

“How would life have ever been the same if this wall had carved in it one less name? 

“He leaves the letters asking, "Who caused my mother's tears, was it Washington or the Viet Cong?"