City Boy - The Day the Earth Caught Fire

City Boy
The Day the Eath Caught Fire
From The Day the Earth Caught Fire 1979

The day the Earth caught fire
We stood outside the world was laughing
And in the city square
They cast umbrellas to the sky
The sun above my head was burning greedy red
The horns began to blow "Three Cheers for Jericho"

The first evacuee
I was headed for the sea, I saw them
The roadside refugees
The boys with bloody knees who waved
Abandoned cars that lay too tired to drive away
"A World in Flames Today" was all the papers
Had to say

Run for your life (The Earth's caught fire)
Run for your life (The Earth's caught fire)
Run, run, run
Run for your life (The Earth's on fire)
Run for your life (The Earth's on fire)
Run, run, run

The streetcar prophet said,
"You thought that God was dead-I warned you
The sinners and the saved
They fell down to their knees and prayed
Believers held their breath and stoned a witch to death
The leaders and the led said "Blow the bloody
Reds away!"

Run for your life (The Earth's caught fire)
Run for your life (The Earth's caught fire)
Run, run, run
Run for your life (The Earth's on fire)
Run for your life (The Earth's on fire)
Run. run, run

[taklampan]

19 year old here. Glad my dad introduced me to this very underrated band

[mattiasvejdegren]

I have all their albums on vinyl...and it is fucking frustrating that they never hit that number one!! Come on...one of the best bands of all time!! 💗💗💗😀😱

[stratomm]

I love City Boy, The love of my life since 40+ years, I'm always wrong.

[robertballot]

Let's face it. We were damn lucky to get output like this from the record companies. Looking back, I think everybody in the industry misjudged the public's appetite for immaculately crafted compositions such as this. But what a great historical error that was. Those of us who enjoyed that era for all its sophistication in songwriting and power in the way the songs were played lived through something that had never happened before and likely never will again. City Boy really gave us their all, with little commercial encouragement. We owe them a great debt of gratitude for believing in themselves as much as those lucky enough to understand what they were striving for -- and accomplishing -- did and continue to do so.

[maelinjoli]

that guitar solo at the end just blow me away---that song is a masterpiece

[herdofblue]

This album took me through my youth. One of the best albums ever made

[georgetsopotos]

One of the best songs on Planet it caught

[constantinosxenos]

First time i hesrd it on the radio back in the Day, i was blkwn away!!!! Can i call ita masterpiece??? Damn sure i

[mikeparkerriders]

City Boy. One of the best of the 1980s.

[ianpmckay]

Strangely prophetic track in times of widespread wild fires and searing global temperatures today.
A wonderful live band - really glad I got to see them a few times back home in Birmingham in the late 1970s. 🤟

[ErikDeMann]

Probably one of the best concept albums ever created.

[turncoatgoo]

This song, of course seems to be everyone's favorite. Especially among the younger kids. I love all their albums equally. I bought them in order from the very 1st LP to each consecutive release. That's the best way to love this band.

[Dacman]

Mike Slamer entered the world as a guitarist to behold.

[timcolder]

Got the 7inch single of this and 5705 but vastly underated and hardly heard on uk radio.Great guitar solo on 5705. Video to this single superbly edited.

[blazak]

I loved this album in the 1980s. It became reality in the 2020s.

[peteruk]

I remember hearing this on the radio - unusually for such a long track it was played in full. At the end of it the DJ seemed speechless until after a long pause he just said "WOW!!"

[lindasilver]

I used to listen to this song when I was young. And it came back to my mind in these days. Stay home and stay safe.

[bardo]

You should I own all of the albums on vinyl and most of their songs are that good. Imo City Boy is like a mix between 10cc and Queen .

[davidatwell]

Sorry, but I am enjoying the hell out of this tune and again THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH FOR THE POST! You have no idea what this tune means to me, yeah it's Armageddon, but in my time and place, It's fucking a completely other world( I mean that in a damn good way, I was a teenager all of 16 with this same girl ) Talk about coincidences, WOW. THANKS AGAIN.So many memories! Great ! ! !

[ethericboy]

One of the greatest albums of its time! And don"t try saying anything else!