We Didn't Start the Fire

E308717

"We Didn't Start the Fire" is a rapid-fire, historically themed pop-rock song by Billy Joel that lists major events and figures from the mid-20th century to the late 1980s.

All labels observed (2)

Label Occurrences
We Didn't Start the Fire canonical 5
We Didn’t Start the Fire 1

How this entity was disambiguated

Statements (60)

Predicate Object
instanceOf single
song
album Storm Front
artist Billy Joel
chartPositionUSBillboardHot100 1
chronology Billy Joel singles
composer Billy Joel
countryOfOrigin United States of America
surface form: United States
decadeOfRelease 1980s
followedBy I Go to Extremes
follows Baby Grand
genre pop rock
rock
hasMusicVideo yes
language English
length 4:49
lyricist Billy Joel
lyricStyle rapid-fire list of events and figures
mentions HIV/AIDS
surface form: AIDS

Ruhollah Khomeini
surface form: Ayatollah Khomeini

Bay of Pigs Invasion
surface form: Bay of Pigs invasion

Birth control
Charles de Gaulle
Crack cocaine
Doris Day
Dwight D. Eisenhower
surface form: Eisenhower

H-Bomb
President Harry S. Truman
surface form: Harry S. Truman

Ho Chi Minh
John F. Kennedy
surface form: JFK

Joe DiMaggio
Joseph McCarthy
surface form: Joe McCarthy

Johnnie Ray
Korean War
Lebanon
Marlon Brando
Panmunjom
Punk rock
Red China
Richard Nixon
Ronald Reagan
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
surface form: Rosenbergs

South Pacific
Sputnik 1
surface form: Sputnik

Sugar Ray
The Catcher in the Rye
The King and I
Watergate scandal
surface form: Watergate
notableFor dense, reference-heavy lyrics
listing historical events in chronological order
partOf Storm Front
peakChartPosition US Billboard Hot 100 number-one single
performer Billy Joel
recordLabel Columbia Records
releaseDate 1989
singleReleaseYear 1989
theme 20th-century history
Cold War era
historical events
timePeriodCovered late 1940s to late 1980s

How these facts were elicited

Referenced by (6)

Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.

Billy Joel notableWork We Didn't Start the Fire
Movin’ Out hasSong We Didn't Start the Fire
this entity surface form: We Didn’t Start the Fire
Storm Front hasPart We Didn't Start the Fire
Storm Front notableWork We Didn't Start the Fire
Storm Front hasSingle We Didn't Start the Fire
Storm Front significantSong We Didn't Start the Fire