Story Behind The Song

I wanted to write something new and different. I had to do some research for this song. I compiled a time line of major world events. Sadly, the main theme that seems to recur is war, oppression and bloodshed. So I decided to make a refrain that answe

Song Description

This song is a journey through time from 3000 BC to the present. The instruments used evolve along with the lyric.

Lyrics

Verse 1:
Tigris and Euphrates, five thousand years ago,
The Pharaohs ruling Egypt, Hammurabi?s code.
King David and King Solomon, wisdom through and through,
Israel and Judah split into two.

Sparta?s wars, Draco?s laws, Cyrus the Great,
Buddha and Confucius temper all this hate.
Three hundred men fight to their death while the plague kills half the Greeks,
God please stop this suffering, help us Hippocrates.

Build a wall ?round China, keep things as they are,
Romans conquer everything, near, dear and far.
When you least expect it, your closest friend may say,
Julius Caesar, Et tu Brute?

Jesus Christ a savior, Nero burns down Rome,
Jerusalem falls again, 10,000 Jews without a home.
Muhammad leads his people, Islam lights the way,
Tower of London, Notre Dame at least six crusades.

Refrain:
Peace, Peace, Peace, Peace?Find a way for peace

Verse 2:
Genghis Kahn rules Persia, Russia and much more,
British aristocracy no Magna Carta for the poor.
China invents gun powder, rockets blasting by,
Kubla Khan rules East and West, Chinese men get high.

Thirty million people die, the damn Bubonic Plague,
Just when we?ve learned from the printing press comes the African Slave Trade.
Columbus runs into ground but he thinks he?s found his way,
He didn?t stop to think about what all the natives had to say.

Here comes Martin Luther ain?t it curious there?s two?
Nails his thesis to the door, makes his old church anew.
Henry VIII is chopping heads; his wife is on the block,
The Puritans say toodle-loo and head to Plymouth Rock.

The Salem Witch Trials and slavery, how is this New World free?
Sing old songs with new words??My Country tis of Thee?.
No Taxation Without Representation or so they did decree,
Just to drive the point in harder, here?s a little tea.

Refrain:
Peace, Peace, Peace, Peace?Find a way for peace

Verse 3:
Revolution, Constitution, and Alien Sedition Act,
No Wonder Civil War broke out, freedom ain?t just a pact.
Abolition, Assassination, for centuries we cry,
There?s blood on every continent, and we?re the reason why.

When we arrive to modern days, nothing?s really changed,
One step forward, one step back, a World War is waged.
Treaty stops the bloodshed, and women get to vote,
Immigration quota keeps the refugees afloat.

A great depression, rules of succession, Hitler rises strong,
Bonds for bullets, airplanes and a hydrogen bomb.
Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Auschwitz and much more,
Stop and ask the obvious, what are we fighting for?

Refrain:
Peace, Peace, Peace, Peace?Find a way for peace

Verse 4:
Things calm down, civil rights reform, progress on the way,
Malcolm X, Dr. King, and President J.F.K.
Man on the moon, Miranda, we?re righting every wrong,
Then all of a sudden, look out the Viet Cong.

After all the jungles clear and our soldiers return home,
Agent Orange memories of a bloody war zone.
Hand shakes at Camp David, Israel and the PLO,
Then the Soviets invade Afghanistan and our Olympians leave Moscow.

Supply side economics equals record deficit,
The poor only get poorer, while the rich get filthy rich.
INF stops a cold war, so they sell off all the arms,
To a quiet enemy who cares not who he harms.

CNN in Baghdad, mixing blood with oil,
It?s okay as long as we don?t fight on our own soil.
Kenya and Tanzania, brought us to our knees,
While in the Oval Office, an intern tries to please.

Refrain:
Peace, Peace, Peace, Peace?Find a way for peace

Verse 5:
The USS Cole has a hole, terror on the brink,
We elect a President, the court says so you think.
Once in power for an hour, tax cuts everyone,
Look up at that calendar, it?s reading 911.

So we hunt the evil doers where they think that they can hide,
But for some reason, Osama?s not inside.
We wave our flags and acquiesce to the patriotic drum,
And invade a country while the world won?t lend one gun.

And back here in our nation, the levees give way,
And all the poor people in the Bayou wash away.
FEMA?s line is busy; no one can get through,
Neighbors looting neighbors, ain?t nothing we can do!

Let?s all learn a lesson, from history?s transgressions,
Compromise, talk things out, and make a few concessions.
We?re all owed our freedoms to live as we do chose,
But we must somehow coexist; if not?we all lose.