Towards the end of 1969, a few months after the first human moon landing, an album was released in the USA called "Willy and the Poor Boys" which featured the now iconic song "Fortunate Son". Another song on the album was "It Came Out of the Sky".
Below is that song, its lyrics, and some comments on it that occur to me. (As of now, for copyright reasons Youtube blocks the song on mobile devices but it can be heard on desktops.)
Below is that song, its lyrics, and some comments on it that occur to me. (As of now, for copyright reasons Youtube blocks the song on mobile devices but it can be heard on desktops.)
I see the song as saying this: People tend to react to new, unknown phenomena or developments based narrowly on the way they already see the world, the way they've always done things. Few, if any, can really break free of this mental constraint. (I think this makes the song a musical version of Plato's "Allegory of the Cave.")
It Came Out Of The Sky Lyrics
Oh, it came out of the sky, landed just a little south of Moline
Jody fell out of his tractor, couldn't believe what he'd seen
Laid on the ground and shook, fearin' for his life
Then he ran all the way to town screamin' "It came out of the sky!"
Well, a crowd gathered 'round and a scientist said it was marsh gas [1]
Spiro [2] came to make a speech about raising the Mars Tax
The Vatican said, "Woe, the Lord has come"
Hollywood rushed out an epic film
And Ronnie the Populist [3] said it was a communist plot
Oh! [Guitar]
Oh, the newspapers came and made Jody a national hero
Walter and Eric [4] said they'd put him on a network TV show
The White House said, "Put the thing in the Blue Room"
The Vatican said, "No, it belongs in Rome."
And Jody said, "It's mine but you can have it for seventeen million!" [5]
Oh, it came out of the sky, landed just a little south of Moline
Jody fell out of his tractor, couldn't believe what he'd seen
Laid on the ground a shakin', fearin' for his life
Then he ran all the way to town screamin' "It came out of the sky!"
[Notes and Comments]
[1] The government often classified purported UFO sightings as "marsh gas" (whatever that is). The lyric is not "a government spokesman said it was marsh gas," though, but rather "a scientist." Scientists have always had an interest, on behalf of pride in their field, in insisting that all phenomena can be explained with presently-known information and theory.
[2] This is Spiro Agnew, Vice President at the time, under Nixon. Why they chose "Spiro" for making a speech about raising a "Mars Tax", I don't know.
[3] "Ronnie the Populist" must be Ronald Reagan, then governor of California (elected Nov. 1966, served till Jan. 1975) and conservative spokesman (from the 1950s), later president.
[4] Walter Cronkite, fatherly news figure many years ago. Who Eric was, I don't know.
[5] "Jody," a country-bumpkin figure here, is the only character in this song who doesn't spin the UFO's arrival for his own personal agenda. He just runs off to alert the others, attracts a crowd of locals, and then worldwide attention. Jody, though, seems uninterested in the UFO, and in the end all he cares about is this potential huge cash payout he asks for. An apparently genuine alien spacecraft (if that's what "it" of the song is) should be in the national interest to study and understand. That they put in this lyric at all ("you can have it for seventeen million") shows how confident the USA was in 1969 in itself and its institutions; Here we have this guy, Jody, a nobody, who comes across a UFO landing, would (it is implied) have his rights respected enough to be paid for the UFO, rather than having the UFO seized by the army and Jody punched in the stomach for protesting or jailed for a while (as might happen elsewhere). In the end, this is meant to be a comedic song, but comedy has to be plausible. I don't think that implied respect for the rights of a "Jody"-like figure is as plausible in today's USA.
Oh, it came out of the sky, landed just a little south of Moline
Jody fell out of his tractor, couldn't believe what he'd seen
Laid on the ground and shook, fearin' for his life
Then he ran all the way to town screamin' "It came out of the sky!"
Well, a crowd gathered 'round and a scientist said it was marsh gas [1]
Spiro [2] came to make a speech about raising the Mars Tax
The Vatican said, "Woe, the Lord has come"
Hollywood rushed out an epic film
And Ronnie the Populist [3] said it was a communist plot
Oh! [Guitar]
Oh, the newspapers came and made Jody a national hero
Walter and Eric [4] said they'd put him on a network TV show
The White House said, "Put the thing in the Blue Room"
The Vatican said, "No, it belongs in Rome."
And Jody said, "It's mine but you can have it for seventeen million!" [5]
Oh, it came out of the sky, landed just a little south of Moline
Jody fell out of his tractor, couldn't believe what he'd seen
Laid on the ground a shakin', fearin' for his life
Then he ran all the way to town screamin' "It came out of the sky!"
[Notes and Comments]
[1] The government often classified purported UFO sightings as "marsh gas" (whatever that is). The lyric is not "a government spokesman said it was marsh gas," though, but rather "a scientist." Scientists have always had an interest, on behalf of pride in their field, in insisting that all phenomena can be explained with presently-known information and theory.
[2] This is Spiro Agnew, Vice President at the time, under Nixon. Why they chose "Spiro" for making a speech about raising a "Mars Tax", I don't know.
[3] "Ronnie the Populist" must be Ronald Reagan, then governor of California (elected Nov. 1966, served till Jan. 1975) and conservative spokesman (from the 1950s), later president.
[4] Walter Cronkite, fatherly news figure many years ago. Who Eric was, I don't know.
[5] "Jody," a country-bumpkin figure here, is the only character in this song who doesn't spin the UFO's arrival for his own personal agenda. He just runs off to alert the others, attracts a crowd of locals, and then worldwide attention. Jody, though, seems uninterested in the UFO, and in the end all he cares about is this potential huge cash payout he asks for. An apparently genuine alien spacecraft (if that's what "it" of the song is) should be in the national interest to study and understand. That they put in this lyric at all ("you can have it for seventeen million") shows how confident the USA was in 1969 in itself and its institutions; Here we have this guy, Jody, a nobody, who comes across a UFO landing, would (it is implied) have his rights respected enough to be paid for the UFO, rather than having the UFO seized by the army and Jody punched in the stomach for protesting or jailed for a while (as might happen elsewhere). In the end, this is meant to be a comedic song, but comedy has to be plausible. I don't think that implied respect for the rights of a "Jody"-like figure is as plausible in today's USA.
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