"We Didn't Start the Fire" is a song by Billy Joel that makes reference to a catalogue of headline events during his lifetime, from March 1949 (Joel was born on May 9 of that year) to 1989, when the song was released on his album Storm Front. The events are mixed with a refrain asserting "we didn't start the fire". The song was a number-one hit in the US.

The song and music video have been interpreted as a rebuttal to criticism of Joel's Baby Boomer generation, from both its preceding and succeeding generations. The song's title and refrain imply that the frenzied and troubled state which others were criticizing had been the state of the world since long before his generation's time, but that this was being ignored by their critics.

Joel has a strong interest in history. "I'm a history nut. I devour history books. At one time I wanted to be a history teacher." According to his mother, he was a bookworm by the age of seven. Unlike most of Joel's songs, the lyrics were written before the melody, owing to the somewhat unusual style of the song. The song was a huge commercial success and was Joel's third Billboard#1 hit. It was nominated for the Grammy Award for Record of the Year.

I had turned forty. It was 1989 and I said "Okay, what's happened in my life?" I wrote down the year 1949. Okay, Harry Truman was president. Popular singer of the day, Doris Day. China went Communist. Another popular singer, Johnnie Ray. Big Broadway show, South Pacific. Journalist, Walter Winchell. Athlete, Joe DiMaggio. Then I went on to 1950 [...]. It's one of the worst melodies I've ever written. I kind of like the lyric though.

Although the song ranked #1 in the U.S., and #7 in the UK, Blendermagazine ranked "We Didn't Start the Fire" #41 on its list of the "50 Worst Songs Ever". "We Didn't Start the Fire" also appeared in the same spot on VH1's 50 Most Awesomely Bad Songs Ever, a collaboration with Blenderin 2004.

This song could be classified as a patter song characterized by its moderately fast tempo with rapid succession of rhythmic lyrics.

A music video for the single was directed by Chris Blum, which chronicles a middle-class married couple and their goal of the American Dream: a home, careers and children. This is juxtaposed with the tumultuous social times of the second half of the 20th century (e.g., bra burning). The singer acts as an omnipresent observer. During each chorus, Joel beats on a table while, in the background, famous photographs (of Lee Harvey Oswald's assassination and Nguyễn Văn Lém's execution, among others) are consumed by fire.

Stream of consciousness in style, the song could be considered a natural successor to songs such as "Subterranean Homesick Blues", "Life Is a Rock (But the Radio Rolled Me)" and "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)", as it consists of a series of seemingly unrelated images in a rapid-fire, half-spoken, half-sung vocal style.

Though the lyric is rapid-fire with several people and events mentioned in a single word each, there is wide-spread agreement on the meaning of the lyric. Steven Ettinger wrote,

The following events are in the order that they appear in the song, which is, with two possible exceptions, chronological. The lyric for each individual event is brief and the events are punctuated by the chorus and other lyrical elements. The following list includes longer, more descriptive names for clarity. Events from a variety of contexts, such as popular entertainment, foreign affairs, and sports, are intermingled, giving an impression of the culture of the time as a whole. There are 119 items listed in the song.

(Note that these two items, while later chronologically than the two 1976 items, come immediately before them in the song.)

(Note that these two items, while earlier chronologically than the two 1977 items, come immediately after them in the song)

Of the 56 individuals mentioned by name in the song, the following nine are still alive as of March 2010: Doris Day, Queen Elizabeth II, Brigitte Bardot, Fidel Castro, Chubby Checker, Bob Dylan, John Glenn, Sally Ride, and Bernhard Goetz.

Johnnie Ray, Joe DiMaggio, Richard Nixon, Roy Campanella, Mickey Mantle, Floyd Patterson, Marlon Brando, Menachem Begin, Ronald Reagan and J.D. Salinger were all alive when the song was released but have died since.

Two individuals, John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon, are mentioned by name twice in the song.

The only U.S. Presidents in office from 1949 to 1989 not mentioned in the song are Lyndon Johnson, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter.

The Forms recorded a cover of the song for Engine Room Recordings' compilation album Guilt by Association Vol. 2, which was released in November 2008.

In 2009, CollegeHumor released a parody of the song on video-sharing website YouTube, entitled "We Didn't Start the Flame War", referring to flame wars on the Internet, and plays in the same style to the song it parodies. As of March 2010, over 4.7 million people have watched the video.

Cold Spring Harbor · Piano Man · Streetlife Serenade · Turnstiles · The Stranger · 52nd Street · Glass Houses · The Nylon Curtain · An Innocent Man · The Bridge · Storm Front · River of Dreams · Fantasies & Delusions

Songs in the Attic · KOHЦEPT · 2000 Years: The Millennium Concert · 12 Gardens Live

Greatest Hits, Vols. 1-3 · The Ultimate Collection · The Essential Billy Joel · Piano Man: The Very Best of Billy Joel · My Lives

"Piano Man" · "Worse Comes to Worst" · "Travelin' Prayer" · "The Entertainer" · "New York State of Mind" · "Just the Way You Are" · "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)" · "Only the Good Die Young" · "She's Always a Woman" · "The Stranger" · "My Life" · "Big Shot" · "Honesty" · "Until the Night" · "All for Leyna" · "You May Be Right" · "It's Still Rock and Roll to Me" · "Don't Ask Me Why" · "Sometimes a Fantasy" · "Say Goodbye to Hollywood" (Live) · "She's Got a Way" (Live) · "Pressure" · "Allentown" · "Goodnight Saigon" · "Tell Her About It" · "Uptown Girl" · "An Innocent Man" · "The Longest Time" · "Leave a Tender Moment Alone" · "This Night" · "Keeping the Faith" · "You're Only Human (Second Wind)" · "The Night Is Still Young" · "Modern Woman" · "A Matter of Trust" · "Baby Grand" · "This Is the Time" · " We Didn't Start the Fire " · "Leningrad" · "I Go to Extremes" · "And So It Goes" · "That's Not Her Style" · "The Downeaster 'Alexa'" · "Shameless" · "All Shook Up" · "The River of Dreams" · "All About Soul" · "No Man's Land" · "Lullabye (Goodnight, My Angel)" · "To Make You Feel My Love" · "Hey Girl" · "All My Life" · "Christmas in Fallujah"

Discography · Movin' Out