I love history, so please remember that I’m a geek. I remember my family owned an extremely outdated encyclopedia set that I would read through; mainly for the history sections, though I’ve never read Grays Sports Almanac: Complete Sports Statistics 1950-2000.

I love trying to understand why certain historical events have happened, when they happened, who was involved, what actually happened, how they are connected to the present, and of course, whether the Doctor was involved or not.

I’ve just stopped and read what I’ve written, and I couldn’t have sounded more of a geek, than if I had actually tried. Anyway, this is why I have developed a useless ability to remember the dates of historical events. This ability doesn’t help me socially or professionally, but it does keep me at home and prevents me from trading comic books in dark alleys.

The point of this ramble is that my love of history led me to love We Didn’t Start the Fire by Billy Joel. If I ever produce a soundtrack to my life, We Didn’t Start the Fire will be on it.

If you have no idea about the song or have never heard it, then sit down, relax, and prepare yourself.

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We Didn’t Start the Fire was released in the much more innocent time of 1989, when Bill Cosby was the king of sitcoms, Donald Trump was still married to Ivana, Harvey Weinstein had started as an executive producer, Vladimir Putin was still in the KGB, and Kim Jong Un was five years old.

The song reached number one on the United States Billboard Hot 100 in 1989 and has become part of pop culture with various themes. Over the years, critics of the song have trashed it, along with Billy Joel himself, coming out and stating his dislike for it.

So what is the song about? Well, I’m not intelligent enough to break the song down into its musical components, but what I am going to do is gush over the lyrics.

To me, it’s like rap, because the words are rapid-fire, and they are about events and people from the 20th century, circa 1948-1989. The historical references have influenced the United States, but also the world, both positively and negatively, which makes them extremely important; well, at least to me.

As for the chorus, several people could give you different explanations for the meaning behind the lyrics, but for what it’s worth, I’m probably wrong. However, I’ll let you know what it means to me.

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

The fire could represent multiple things like violence, hatred, war, bigotry, racism, sexism, and capitalism. It could be all of them or none of them; though the point is that the fire has existed and been burning since we descended from the trees and spread out across Eastern and Southern Africa.

The world of 2024 didn’t start the fire, nor did the world of 1989. Events and people have compounded and added to national and international problems over the centuries; and in the case of the song, decades. This means the next generation has to fight and solve the issues created by previous generations; even though they have been trying to stop the spread of the fire. At least to me, it does.

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

After every single person who is alive at this moment in time has died, the world will still continue to turn, and the fire will still be burning, awaiting the next generation of people to meet it. In 5, 10, 25, 50, 100, or 250 years, the fire will continue to burn, just as it always has.

Some of the best messages; again, at least to me, in the song are these:

• If we don’t understand the past, we are doomed to repeat the same mistakes.
• You are not personally guilty, along with your generation, for the condition of the world, whether its politically, socially, physically, etc.
• What you can be guilty of, is what you are going to do about the condition of the world.

And the coolest message in the song is this:

People have the capacity for tremendous evil, just as they have the capacity for amazing good. As a species, we will never stop the fire from burning, we just can’t. But what we can do is fight the spread of the fire, through our own actions, along with our children and grandchildren, by teaching them to care. If we can restrict and limit the spread of the fire, the damage will be least destructive for us, and for future generations. I feel we can do this through information, knowledge and education; you know, that old chestnut.

In a small way, and in the greatest example of my hubris, the vanity project that is Some Geek Told Me, is an ode to We Didn’t Start the Fire. One of the factors for Some Geek Told Me’s creation, was feeling I wasn’t doing enough to fight the spread of the fire.

We Didn’t Start the Fire is one of my favourite songs, so I decided to try and back up my big mouth and actually do something. I know it’s hubris, I really do, and I know Billy Joel would deem this quite sad, but I’m ok with that.

Having said all of this, I’m starting a new project within Some Geek Told Me. I realise many other people have already done this, but I’m going to take a crack at it. Just like the Tour of the Solar System, I’m going to have a monthly blog post about We Didn’t Start the Fire, looking at the historical references.

I’m going to talk about them in groups, like 1955-1957, or 1958-1961, rather than in decades or simply as years. There are 118 historical references in the song, so this poorly constructed idea will take some time. You have been warned. The music video is quite outstanding as well. Again, to my geeky arse, it is.

Well, that’s it for another week. Thank you once again for reading, following, and subscribing to Some Geek Told Me. Please don’t forget to walk your dog, read a banned book, paint a rainbow, and I’ll see you next week.

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