3:00 - okay, some context: this is talking about how the optimism of the 60s/flower power generation went sour in the wake of various political upheavals both from within and outside - the continuing quagmire of the Cold War, the Manson Family murders, Altamont, the deaths of JFK, RFK, MLK and Malcolm X - which led to the 70s when free love and drugs slid into debauchery, excess and insanity that many ended up getting consumed by and not surviving. As a result, in the 80s, politics and culture shifted hard to the right, you had the AIDS epidemic and the drug culture shifted from supposedly soft drugs like weed and hallucinogens to coke and heroin and eventually to crack and ecstasy. By the 90s there was a generational nostalgia for the innocence and optimism of the 60s that had seemingly been lost, and this song is definitely calling back to it, but given that consumer culture never really went away, there is a sort of cynical undertone to a lot of the lyrics.
Generational nostalgia existed before the 90s - Grease is an example from the 70s that's harking back to the 1950s - but the 90s was when it really seemed to become sort of all consuming, partly because of the end of the Cold War and the fact many people struggled to define what the zeitgeist was without that aspect of politics to frame our understanding of the world around. You have James Bond grappling with it in Goldeneye, Austin Powers being a unfrozen caveman spy out of his original context, movies like Ronin that are about former Cold War spies being forced to take mercenary contract work in a nebulous dust-up between the Russian mob and the IRA. It was a strange and confusing time for many people, and whilst that is as far in the past from us now as the 60s was to people when this song came out, we are all still living with the repercussions of that era decades later.
It was written during the whole Rodney King thing. The song was basically a social and racial battle cry. It was a sort of "Can't we all get along?" song for the time when I wrote it. It was just about all the things that were going on around me as a young person. And I'm, like, God, what is going on? I don't understand why this is happening. It's like we might as well be walking around a planet on fire. And that's how it came about.
RIP Steve Harwell
3:00 - okay, some context: this is talking about how the optimism of the 60s/flower power generation went sour in the wake of various political upheavals both from within and outside - the continuing quagmire of the Cold War, the Manson Family murders, Altamont, the deaths of JFK, RFK, MLK and Malcolm X - which led to the 70s when free love and drugs slid into debauchery, excess and insanity that many ended up getting consumed by and not surviving. As a result, in the 80s, politics and culture shifted hard to the right, you had the AIDS epidemic and the drug culture shifted from supposedly soft drugs like weed and hallucinogens to coke and heroin and eventually to crack and ecstasy. By the 90s there was a generational nostalgia for the innocence and optimism of the 60s that had seemingly been lost, and this song is definitely calling back to it, but given that consumer culture never really went away, there is a sort of cynical undertone to a lot of the lyrics.
Generational nostalgia existed before the 90s - Grease is an example from the 70s that's harking back to the 1950s - but the 90s was when it really seemed to become sort of all consuming, partly because of the end of the Cold War and the fact many people struggled to define what the zeitgeist was without that aspect of politics to frame our understanding of the world around. You have James Bond grappling with it in Goldeneye, Austin Powers being a unfrozen caveman spy out of his original context, movies like Ronin that are about former Cold War spies being forced to take mercenary contract work in a nebulous dust-up between the Russian mob and the IRA. It was a strange and confusing time for many people, and whilst that is as far in the past from us now as the 60s was to people when this song came out, we are all still living with the repercussions of that era decades later.
Your comment deserves more likes
My guy needs to gage a breath. He has this as a clip board and puts it in every smash mouth video i promise
@@mikeredd8833 - not all of them. And even if I did, I don't see why I should consider that a bad thing.
It was written during the whole Rodney King thing. The song was basically a social and racial battle cry. It was a sort of "Can't we all get along?" song for the time when I wrote it. It was just about all the things that were going on around me as a young person. And I'm, like, God, what is going on? I don't understand why this is happening. It's like we might as well be walking around a planet on fire. And that's how it came about.
Are we not going to talk about this person being a weirdo
Love the 60's vibe to this number ... Smash-ing ...!! 😄
This has been in a few movies so you may have heard it in one of them.
My favourite SM song groovy 😂😎🏖️☀
Love this, clever and catchy!
Cali and Florida styles. Ripping life !
TE QUEDASTES SOLO BROTHER.......WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR CHICK ?
That is the worst song on that album, try heave ho, pet names, or padrino