Unlike Greenwich Village folk singers responding to the Vietnam conflict, such as Phil Ochs or Pete Seeger, Prine didn’t aim to rally crowds with big gestures in those days. Instead, his sense of social commentary felt more personal, as if designed for the front stoop, not the public square. “Sam Stone,” a song about a returning veteran ravaged by war, remains so powerful because it channels every argument about the derangement of armed conflict into a single person. “I thought one day that song will be one more Vietnam song,” he said. “But if I did a show and didn’t sing that, people would think I was a traitor. The song doesn’t wear on me.”