Courtesy of JibJab, I’ve had this tune stuck in my head for days now; so I decided to post an annotated version. Note: most of the links are Wikipedia, but not all.
We Didn’t Start the Fire
Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray,
South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio,
Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television,
North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe,Rosenbergs, H-bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjeom,
Brando, The King and I, and The Catcher In The Rye,
Eisenhower, vaccine, England’s got a new queen,
Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye . . .Chorus:
We didn’t start the fire—
It was always burning
Since the world’s been turning.
We didn’t start the fire—
No, we didn’t light it,
But we tried to fight it.Josef Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser, and Prokofiev,
Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc,
Roy Cohn, Juan Perón, Toscanini, Dacron,
Dien Bien Phu falls, Rock Around the Clock,Einstein, James Dean, Brooklyn’s got a winning team,
Davy Crockett, Peter Pan, Elvis Presley, Disneyland,
Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Khrushchev,
Princess Grace, Peyton Place, trouble in the Suez . . .Chorus
Little Rock, Pasternak, Mickey Mantle, Kerouac,
Sputnik, Zhou Enlai, Bridge On The River Kwai,
Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball,
Starkweather homicide, children of thalidomide,Buddy Holly, Ben-Hur, space monkey, Mafia,
Hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no-go,
U-2, Syngman Rhee, payola and Kennedy,
Chubby Checker, Psycho, Belgians in the Congo . . .Chorus
Hemingway, Eichmann, Stranger in a Strange Land,
Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs invasion,
Lawrence of Arabia, British Beatlemania,
Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson,
Pope Paul, Malcolm X, British politician sex,
J.F.K. blown away, what else do I have to say?!Chorus
Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon back again,
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock,
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline,
Ayatollahs in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan,Wheel of Fortune, Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide,
Foreign debts, homeless vets, AIDS, crack, Bernie Goetz,
Hypodermics on the shore, China’s under martial law,
Rock-and-roller cola wars, I can’t take it anymore!We didn’t start the fire—
It was always burning
Since the world’s been turning.
We didn’t start the fire—
But when we are gone,
It will still go on, and on, and on, and on, and on . . .Words and music: Billy Joel
© 1989 Sony Music Entertainment Inc.
From the album Storm Front, by Billy Joel
There are a couple of those out there. Thanks for the recall of this. One great song.
Alan
Yeah, I know Wikipedia has a page on the song with a list . . . though I think whoever did that page made a mistake or two, and was a trifle too willing just to link to other Wikipages. Thanks for the good word–glad you appreciated it.
I was amazed to read the chorus and realize I recognized it, as the words of the verses are wholly unfamiliar. I probably have heard it while shopping – about the only place I’m generally exposed to popular music as I don’t listen to the radio – and the overall noise level in stores tends to drown out a lot. Of course, I generally can’t make out much of the lyrics in popular music anyway.
That and the fact that the chorus is easy to pick up, while the verses aren’t–and for that matter, the equal fact that that song was everywhere 18-19 years ago, and has stayed on the air a lot more than most hits do. I don’t listen to pop radio either, and never have, but I’ve still heard this song a great many times.
Plus, as I say, I really do enjoy it; history with a good hook is a rare thing. 🙂