"We Didn't Start The Fire" by Billy Joel
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, Panmunjom
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 Peron, Toscanini, dacron
Dien Bien Phu and "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, Chou En-Lai, "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
U2, 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
JFK, 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
Ayatollolah's 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
CHORUS
We didn't start the fire
But when we are gone
Will it still burn on, and on, and on, and on...
What do you think of the message with the song? What do you think of the video? What is the message that this video is trying to convey?
Lets talk about it.
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Comments: 90
My favorite will still always be "Piano Man," though..........
(By the way..........when did he lose all his hair????)
I think the song signifies the messes all these people created (perhaps unwittingly, even) and the aftermath that society has to deal with???
Glad you stopped by.
Esther! This had to have taken forever to include all of these links! You must have the patience of Job!
I never realized U2 was mentioned in it. One more reason to love him. :)
But the song does have a good historical message. Man has always had wars, and fought with each other, and yet we have also developed many new technologies that have both increased our ability to kill each other and our selves, and improve the world we live in. THe countries that have the most freedoms, develop the most on all areas, so in that capitalism works, the ones that have the fewest develop much less and often copy what the others have built, as with Communism.
THe video does take it a lot deeper in that instead of words sluring by so fast you cannot understand them, you can see what is being said.
Great amount of work on this Esther. Thanks. God job. Do you make the movies too?
In a time when dinosaurs walked the earth
When the land was swamp and caves were home
In an age when prize possession was fire
To search for landscapes men would roam.
Then the tribes they came to steal their fire
And the wolves they howled into the night
As they fought a vicious angry battle
to save the power of warmth and light.
Drawn by quest for fire
They searched all through the land
Drawn by quest for fire
Discovery of man.
And they thought that when the embers died away
That the flame of life had burnt and died
Didn't know the sparks that made the fire
Were made by rubbing stick and stone.
So they ploughed through the forest and swamps of danger
And they fought the cannibal tribes and beasts
In the search to find another fire
To regain the power of light and heat.
Drawn by quest for fire
They searched across the land
Drawn by quest for fire
Good morning angel. I've got a broad collection of Billy Joel in my music library, I didn't really notice that this wasn't one of them. And I've always loved this song. I cannot believe they left it off a 4-CD box set I have. Thanks for bringing this song back to me. You're a princess. Ever thought about being a cowboy's princess, lol.
& i totally agree with Kimberly's description about the song !
At least that is what I have always believed. Maybe I will google it and come up with a definite answer. :o)
one of my fav. videos
I chose this version of the video because it seemed to go along much better with the song and number two the original video that was made to accompany this song was one in which embedding had been prohibited thus this one with the better history lesson.
It is also a great reminder that our country, as a democracy, has not only the right, but the responsibility to defend herself against any and all attacks against her. This is why I believe McCain will be the better candidate. He understands that philosophy so much better than Obama.
Yes those who have grandchildren and those who don't are indeed leaving a mess for them in this world. Somethings got to give.
They have interviewed the band and some say it's a about the assassination and others talk more about sexual tension. I just think it's cool that they are being ambiguous about it. It depends on which one you ask. Anyway, as a history teacher the idea they are named Franz Ferdinand is cool. Then, to make matters a little odder they use a lot of Russian art and imagery in their videos even though they are not a Russian band.
I love Billy Joel. I had no idea you were doing social commentary songs. I'm actually doing some stuff about social commentary music with my world history class :)
Or maybe it's just been always burning since the world's been turning.
You are such a trip!
Thanks for all of the kind words! ;)
Thanks for this article I enjoyed it and the comments.
thank you for your kind wishes and friendship...
that would be Francis Gary power's U-2, shot down over Russia.
Billy Joel wrote out the lyrics when one of the Beatles kids said he'd lived in a boring time. This song was Billy's 4oth birthday present to himself.
And it reverberated with me... born same month and year as Billy Joel.
Glad you enjoyed this song.
The messages that so many of our contemporaries sang or at least the ones that I most admire are the ones from the 60's and 70's during Viet Nam. Those were songs back then, songs that we could all relate to in one way or another.
Kids today have no concept of the value of money, no respect for their elders, no respect for education, no respect for others or themselves among so many other things that have caused the deterioration of this society at its very core.
I didn't know that you taught. How neat and how great that you do. Music is excellent to use as a teaching tool. I don't know what age kids you teach but really music of any sort is great for them.
I'm glad that you stopped by.
Too deep a subject to delve into in this thread. Another day perhaps.
Crazy that I feel that way because my Sister Martie and I used to watch all of his movies when we were kids as we thought they were so sexy and we thought we were so mature for getting to watch them. haaa!
Realities and perceptions are often times confused. I do believe that as with a song like this we should try to learn from past mistakes. Doing the same things and expecting different results just isn't cutting it anymore.
Thank you for your thoughts.
Yes Judi is a pretty wise lady isn't she?
Gotta run now catch you on the flip flop.
Love Billy Joel, amazingly vibrant and energetic in concert to this day!