Speaker 1: This is Jeff Johnson from Cincinnati, Ohio, and I want
my Shirley You Can't Be Serious Podcasts.
Speaker 2: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Surely you Can't
Be Serious Podcast Special Edition Five Minutes of Fire. We
are here talking about the lyrics of We Didn't Start
the Fire by Billy Joel. We're covering only five minutes
at a time, which is about to link for the song,
so it works out kind of nicely. So please join
us as we dive into some new lyrics today.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, so here are the topics that we're
going to be covering today. Dylan Berlin, bave pigs, invasion,
Dylan Berlin.
Speaker 2: Okay, Jason, what can you tell me about Dylan?
Speaker 1: Bob Dylan is who we're talking about today. Mister Robert
Allen Zimmerman was that he was born as in nineteen
forty one in Duluth, Minnesota. He's an American songwriter and singer.
Some say he's the best songwriter to ever live. Moved
to New York City in nineteen sixty one. He signed
with Columbia Records pretty quickly. His first album didn't do much,
but his second album, The Free Will and Bob Dylan
album was very well received and gave us a song
Lowing in the Wind. He became a major figure in
the civil rights movement. On the album Highway sixty one
Revisited in July nineteen sixty five, he came out with
the song like a Rolling Stone. In July of nineteen
sixty six. He also had a motorcycle accident where he
broke his neck. Starred in the nineteen seventy three movie
Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, from which we get
the song Knocking on Heaven's Door. In the late seventies,
he converted to Christianity and released several albums. In nineteen
eighty five, He's sang on We Are the World. In
nineteen eighty eight, he co founded the Traveling Wheelberry's and
is widely believed to be one of the twentieth century's
most influential personalities. Okay, do tell me about Terry Nunn
and Berlin.
Speaker 3: Different.
Speaker 2: This is happening about the real bout. Oh sorry, okay, yes, yeah,
So when I was in sixth grade, the title of
my US History report was Berlin the Divided Country, Because
when I was in sixth grade, the Berlin Wall was
still in existence. So after World War iiO Berlin was
divided up among the Allied powers. The ones that got
East Berlin were the Soviets. After the first fifteen or
so years of the Cold War, there were several folks
in East Berlin that decided they didn't like the Soviet
lifestyle so much. As a matter of fact, three point
five million of them defected from East Berlin over into
West Berlin. And so the Soviets decided, you know what,
they need protection from this influence, and so we're going
to put up a wall. And so on August thirteenth,
nineteen sixty one, they started construction on the Berlin Wall
to quote unquote protected citizens, but everyone knew it was
to keep them from defecting. That wall remained there until
just a couple short months after the release of the song.
We didn't start the fire. It's incredible and was taken
down November ninth, nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 1: Our buddy Vanilla and Plexico said we could do it
entire We didn't start the fire song just on events
of nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 2: And he's not wrong. Okay, Jason, tell me about the
Baya Pigs invasion.
Speaker 1: Okay, April of nineteen sixty one, more than one thousand
Cuban exiles stormed the beaches of the Baya Pigs in
Cuba to launch a revolt against Fidel Castro. Castro had
risen to power in the nineteen fifties. On New Year's
Day nineteen fifty nine, Castro invaded Havana, forcing US backed
Batista to flee. Castro declared himself Prime Minister and signed
agreements to buy oil from Russia. This did not sit
well with the United States, so the US severed all
ties with Cuba. He soon declared himself communist and seized
all US assets in Cuba. So Eisenhower came up with
a plan to train Cuban refugees as freedom fighters. However,
there were several spies in those bands of freedom fighters.
Fast forward a bit to John F. Kennedy. He decides
to move on an invasion and invade Trinidad, which is
an area of Cuba, but at the last second he
switches to the Bay of Pigs, which is interesting because
the area around the bay swampy, making fighting very difficult.
This group of freedom fighters was met by twenty thousand
Cuban troops. Oh gosh, by April nineteenth, the US sends
in air support, but it's a total failure. It's a
complete embarrassment for Kennedy and it actually emboldens Castro and
the USSR. These events pushed us even closer to World
War three.
Speaker 2: Okay, guys, that does it for today's episode. Join us
next time for five minutes of fire.
Speaker 3: Hey, check it out. There's a brand new podcast on
the way exploring the discographies of the Beatles and the
Beach Boys.
Speaker 4: It's called Apples and Oranges and it lodges on February seventh.
Speaker 3: We will be matching albums against each other in a
one v one format, discussing every single track and then
giving our verdict on which album is better.
Speaker 4: Pet Sounds versus Revolving Sergeant Pepper versus Smile.
Speaker 3: Wouldn't it be nice if most people knew how well
the Beach Boys actually held up against the Fab Four.
Speaker 4: Both bands inspired each other to keep pushing the boundaries
of what was possible in pop music here, there, and everywhere, and.
Speaker 3: What we got were some of the greatest albums of
all time.
Speaker 4: Awesommer Long versus A Hard Day's Night, Rivers Sol versus
The Beach boys today.
Speaker 3: So let's come together for some fun, fun fun and
help me Ronda get this podcast off the ground, and
we'll sure appreciate you being around. On February seventh, wherever
you find your podcast
Speaker 4: That's Apples and Oranges February seven,