I have written very few overtly political songs, most of these after my son Chance was born. The May 2004 release by Mission of Burma, ONoffON, contains my song “Wounded World.” This song was written during the FIRST Gulf War (1991, when my son was 2).

While I was obviously writing about the first War in Iraq (easily applicable to our leveling of Afghanistan or the current war in Iraq), I felt that I had managed to avoid some of the problems of certain “protest songs” of the ‘60s. Such as SuperBird by Country Joe and the Fish, that was utterly inseparable from the time (“Lady-Bird” Johnson), or “Motor City’s Burning” by the MC5, about the Detroit riots.

Roger Miller