The Unknown Soldier

"The Unknown Soldier" is the first single from the Doors' 1968 album Waiting for the Sun, released in March of that year by Elektra Records. An accompanying 16mm publicity film for the song featuring the band was directed and produced by Edward Dephoure and Mark Abramson. The song became the band's fourth Top 40 hit in the US, peaking at number 39 on the Billboard Hot 100, and remained upon the Billboard Hot 100 list for eight weeks. Lyrics "The Unknown Soldier" has been perceived as Jim Morrison's reaction to the Vietnam War and the way that conflict was portrayed in American media at the time. According to author Richie Weidman, Morrison was inspired to write the lyrics after visiting the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, at the Arlington National Cemetery, on November 25, 1967; the same day in which the band performed at the Hilton Hotel, International Ballroom. Karl Dallas of Melody Maker formulated that the song is "an apocalyptic piece which seems to sum up the Vietnam-nourished at the centre of American life." Lines such as "Breakfast where the news is read/ Television children fed/ Unborn living, living dead/ Bullets strike the helmet's head", concerned the way news of the war was being presented in the living rooms of ordinary people. The track ends with sounds of crowds cheering and bells tolling, representing an ecstatic celebration of a war being over.