"We Didn't Start the Fire" Reboot, 2023

Fall Out Boy and Billy Joel today - both look a bit different now than in their heydays, eh? :)

So I heard the updated version of "We Didn't Start the Fire" by the band, Fall Out Boy, for the first time yesterday.

Wow, hard to believe it was 1989 when the original version of this song came out, written and recorded by "Piano Man," Billy Joel, (who initially planned to be a history teacher). 

1989 - having taken a year off, I was a freshman in college at the University of Kentucky, the Berlin Wall came down, and Taylor Swift was just born!?!

I remember newspapers talking about how social studies and history teachers had their kids learn and sing this song, encouraging classroom discussion of each topic.

Would classroom discussion of the song and the events in this song happen now - or be allowed to happen - in states like Florida? LOL

We shall see - because last month - who are now somewhat of a relic themselves, if you can believe that - the mid-2000s band, Fall Out Boy, surprised us with a comeback and an updated version of this song on everything that's happened culturally and historically since the song was written 34 years ago.

What's interesting to ask yourself, while listening to this song/reading the lyrics, is what has changed and what has stayed the same?

Did anything just fade away into oblivion over time rather than continue to impact our culture, get better, or get worse? 

Similarly, has anything in the first song continued to impact us for the second song and today, become even more influential than then? 

Let's compare the lyrics of the two below and see, shall we?

Billy Joel, Original Lyrics, 1989 

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

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

Joseph Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev
Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc
Roy Cohn, Juan Peron, 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, Krushchev
Princess Grace, Peyton Place, Trouble in the Suez

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

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

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

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?

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

Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon back again
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline
Ayatollah'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

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 burn on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on

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
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
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

Fall Out Boy, Updated Lyrics, 2023


Captain Planet, Arab Spring, L.A. riots, Rodney King
Deep fakes, earthquakes, Iceland volcano
Oklahoma City bomb, Kurt Cobain, Pokémon

Tiger Woods, MySpace, Monsanto, GMOs
Harry Potter, Twilight, Michael Jackson dies
Nuclear accident, Fukushima, Japan
Crimean Peninsula, Cambridge Analytica
Kim Jong Un, Robert Downey Jr., Iron Man

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're trying to fight it

More war in Afghanistan, Cubs go all the way again
Obama, Spielberg, explosion, Lebanon
Unabomber, Bobbitt, John, bombing Boston Marathon
Balloon Boy, War on Terror, QAnon

Trump gets impeached twice, Polar bears got no ice
Fyre Fest, Black Parade, Michael Phelps, Y2K
Boris Johnson, Brexit, Kanye West and Taylor Swift
Stranger Things, Tiger King, Ever Given, Suez

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're trying to fight it

Sandy Hook, Columbine, Sandra Bland and Tamir Rice
ISIS, LeBron James, Shinzo Abe blown away
Meghan Markle, George Floyd, Burj Khalifa, Metroid
Fermi paradox, Venus and Serena

Oh-oh-oh, Michael Jordan, 23, YouTube killed MTV
SpongeBob, Golden State Killer got caught
Michael Jordan, 45, Woodstock '99
Keaton, Batman, Bush v. Gore, 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
No, we didn't light it, but we're trying to fight it

Elon Musk, Kaepernick, Texas failed electric grid
Jeff Bezos, climate change, white rhino goes extinct
Great Pacific, Garbage Patch, Tom DeLong and aliens
Mars rover, Avatar, self-driving electric cars
SSRI's, Prince and The Queen die
World trade, second plane, what else do I have to say?

We didn't start the fire (we didn't start it)
It was always burning since the world's been turning (oh)
We didn't start the fire (we didn't start it)
But when we are gone, it will still go on (oh-yeah)
And on, and on, and on, an on
And on, and on, and on

We didn't start the fire (fire)
It was always burning since the world's been turning

So here's what I noticed ...

Besides what I mentioned above already - that classrooms used to encourage discussion of the historical and cultural significance of certain events, but now, it's discouraged, or even banned, in some states ...

The absence of any books, or the cultural impact of books, in the Fall Out Boy version. 

HOWEVER - I think that is more a critique of our culture, than of  Fall Out Boy, because they clearly are well read -  but I'm sorry to say, very few take time to read anymore, and thus books themselves do not have the impact on our culture that they once did  :( 

Sports, movies, and music were mentioned as having cultural impact in both, but as mentioned above, have become even more influential than books as far as cultural impact (with the exception of the 1960s, which had more protest songs than we currently do).  

I also noted the trend with music that it's no longer a particular song, or even a full band - the focus appears to be on individuals - whether alone or in collaboration - despite the fact few of the artists actually play any of the instruments played in the song they sing or rap.

For example, the top 10 songs this week are all individual artist names, alone or in collaboration with other individual artists, with only 4 of the artists on the list actually playing any of the instruments on their songs - Morgan Wallen, Luke Combs, Taylor Swift, and Olivia Rodrigo. (Let me know if I missed anyone that actually plays an instrument on these songs as well as sings/raps, on this list). 

Also, what I found extremely interesting is there was no mention at all of COVID or its deniers or anti-vaxxers, which I found interesting - Fall Out Boy avoided it entirely?

You will also note that racism (and the protest of it) continues, let no one say it doesn't.

We also still have war and problems in the Middle East - worsened by 9/11 -  and we still have AIDS (though we do have cocktails that  can suppress the viral load to undetectable levels) and homeless veterans.

We also still have problems with China and Russia Communist-style authoritarianism, perhaps close to cold-war levels, but at the same time are now somewhat dependent on them for certain goods and labor.

Except the difference now is, in some American eyes, this is a GOOD thing when it comes to Russia -  so long as you stamp Trump's name on it and never actually call it communism ;)

On a similar note, espionage and national security threats regarding China, Russia, and the Middle East, by either private citizens or public officials, aren't considered a crime anymore in the court of public perception, at least depending on who is doing it ;)

One positive thing, though,  for the new version that was not mentioned in Billy Joel's version at all, is Fall Out Boy's mention of environmental and climate change and the disappearance, or near disappearance, of certain species once common to us all.

But the most glaringly apparent aspect - which is actually Billy Joel AND Fall Out Boy's point  with both songs - is that there is no one person or party to blame.

If anything, we need to blame ourselves - either for not paying enough attention to these issues/fighting the smaller fires enough or fanning the flames - until they became the raging dumpster fires across America that we see today.

Anything I missed? 

On a lighter note, I must add that Ziggy pug loves both versions of this song, and mostly to dance around with momma to both -  except we change the lyrics to "Pug Didn't Start the Fire" LOL.

The word "pug" is so easy to insert into any word or sentence as substitute, try it out - particularly when you don't want to say curse words.

"Pug off!"

"What the pug?" 

LOL