Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire is a demarcation song: people like it or hate it with a passion. I’m one who loves it more than is appropriate. I mentioned it in conversation a couple of days ago and thought, “2020 has enough going on to fill up this entire song.” My youngest daughter Abby was hanging out this weekend and we decided to work up an new set of lyrics, excluding the chorus.
I’m including the original lyrics by Billy Joel to help you keep track. Our alternate lyrics are in italics. Listen on your fave streaming service and follow along.
Now, without further ado, enjoy We Didn’t Start the Fire: 2020 Edition.
Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray
Donald Trump, Election Day, Joe Biden, bad debate
South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio
Minnesota, black lives matter, getting out the vote.
Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television
Mitch McConnell, Patrick Skinner, Space X mission, deep divisions
North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe
Indonesia, John Lewis, Canada’s Trudeau
Rosenbergs, H-bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom
Van Den Berg, F-Bomb, pay-to-play, Regeneron
Brando, “The King and I” and “The Catcher in the Rye”
Nolan, “No Time To Die,” everybody asking why.
Eisenhower, vaccine, England’s got a new queen
Right-Wing, Left-Wing, ice caps keep on melting
Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye
Little Richard, RBG, Chadwick Boseman 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
Russia’s Putin, Kasparov, Bibi, and Agalarov
Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc
Streaming church, Deborah Birx, banning Tiktok
Roy Cohn, Juan Peron, Toscanini, Dacron
George Floyd, Mike Cohen, Matt Salvini, Macron
Dien Bien Phu falls, “Rock Around the Clock”
Work done from home, kids around the clock.
Einstein, James Dean, Brooklyn’s got a winning team
Bolton, Packer, everybody’s quarantined
Davy Crockett, Peter Pan, Elvis Presley, Disneyland
Lady Gaga, Weinstein, Waxahatchee, Tolkien
Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Krushchev
Whitmer kidnap foiled, cancel culture, more oil
Princess Grace, “Peyton Place,” trouble in the Suez
Saving face, The Good Place, trouble with a Royal
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
TP rush, sanitize, Sarah Cooper, bigger lies
Sputnik, Chou En-Lai, “Bridge on the River Kwai”
Kushner, Trump’s trial, dam on the River Nile
Lebanon, Charlse de Gaulle, California baseball
Beirut, statues fall, season-shortened baseball
Starkweather homicide, children of thalidomide
Bushfires, stay inside, Chinese Uyghurs genocide
Buddy Holly, “Ben Hur”, space monkey, Mafia
Coney Barrett, Netflix, GOP, Pelosi
Hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no-go
Taylor made Folklore, mail-in ballots are go
U2, Syngman Rhee, payola and Kennedy
YouTube, Megan Thee, 25th, and gluten-free
Chubby Checker, “Psycho”, Belgians in the Congo
Kobe Bryant, low-flow, virus 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”
Conaways, Falwell, governmental breakdown
Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs invasion
Broadway, Hamilton, lady bug invasion
“Lawrence of Arabia”, British Beatlemania
Rioting and anarchy, protest White Supremacy
Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson
Megan, Harry, Tampa beats the Yankees
Pope Paul, Malcolm X, British politician sex
Louisville, who is next, British politicians Brex
JFK, blown away, what else do I have to say
Fly-in-hair Mike Pence, what happened to common sense?
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
PPEs, no vaccine, dying from COVID-19
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock
Men shot, tech stocks, respirate, indie rock
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline
Wildfire, losing wine, no Hydroxychloroquine
Ayatollah’s in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan
Trouble brewing in Iran, endorsed by the Taliban
“Wheel of Fortune”, Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide
Social distance, taking sides, rash of farmer suicides
Foreign debts, homeless vets, AIDS, crack, Bernie Goetz
Massive debt, homeless vets, jobs, masks, hedge your bets
Hypodermics on the shores, China’s under martial law
Refugees kept from our shores, Portland’s under martial law
Rock and roller cola wars, i can’t take it anymore
People threaten civil war, can we take it anymore?
Repeat chorus to end
Original lyrics copyright Billy Joel. Alternate lyrics copyright Abigail Duren and Marty Duren.
fides quaerens intellectum
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