We Built This City

"We Built This City" is the debut single by AmericanrockbandStarship, from their 1985 debut albumKnee Deep in the Hoopla. It was written by English musiciansMartin PageandBernie Taupin, who were both living inLos Angelesat the time, and was originally intended as a lament against the closure of many of that city's live music clubs.
The song peaked at No. 1 on theBillboardHot 100. Outside the United States, "We Built This City" topped the charts in Australia and Canada, peaked inside the Top 10 of the charts in Germany, the Republic of Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland, the Top 20 on the charts in Belgium, New Zealand and the United Kingdom and the Top 30 of the charts in Austria and the Netherlands.
The song has gained significant scorn, both for the inscrutability of its lyrics (notably the line "Marconiplays themamba"), and for the contrast between the song's anti-corporate message and its polished, "corporate rock" sound. It topped a 2011Rolling Stonepoll of worst songs of the 1980s by a wide margin, and the magazinesBlenderandGQboth called it theworst song of all time.
The album's title,Knee Deep in the Hoopla, is taken from a lyric in the first verse of this song.
Song co-writersMartin PageandBernie Taupinhave stated that the song is about the decline of live-performance clubs inLos Angelesduring the 1980s.In 2013, Taupin toldRolling Stonethat the "original song was a very dark kind of mid-tempo song ... about how club life in L.A. was being killed off and live acts had no place to go ... A guy calledPeter Wolf[the album's producer] ... got ahold of the demo and totally changed it. He jerry-rigged it into the pop hit it was".In an interview withSongfacts, Page added that the "demo was quite high-energy techno, because that was the sound of the band I was in ... it was a little more edgy. And I'm very pleased with whatStarshipdid with it, because they made it a universally appealing song".
Though "We Built This City" was originally written about Los Angeles, theStarshiprendition referencesSan Francisco(the hometown of both Starship and its predecessors,Jefferson AirplaneandJefferson Starship).MTVexecutive and former DJLes Garlandprovided the DJ voiceover during the song's bridge.While "the city by the bay" refers to San Francisco, the other two phrases used by Garland—"the city that rocks" and "The City That Never Sleeps"—refer toCleveland, Ohio, andNew York City, respectively. To capitalize on this, several radio stations, with the help of jingle companyJAM Creative Productions, customized the bridge when broadcasting the song by adding descriptions of their own local areas or inserting theiridents.
The song was engineered by producerBill Bottrell, written byBernie Taupin,Martin Page,Dennis LambertandPeter Wolfand arranged by Bottrell andJasun Martzwith shared lead vocals byMickey ThomasandGrace Slick.
Billboardsaid that this "unusual rock 'n' roll anthem is as wise as it is rebellious".Cash Boxcalled it "an ear-catching tune" and described it as "dance rock with sharp hooks".
"We Built This City" received aGrammy Awardnomination forBest Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Groupin 1986.
Half Man Half Biscuitparodied the song on theirAchtung Bonoalbum, "We Built This Village on a Trad. Arr. Tune".
In 2004, the magazineBlenderran a feature on "The 50 Worst Songs Ever", in conjunction with theVH1SpecialThe 50 Most Awesomely Bad Songs...Ever.To qualify, songs had to be well-known hits; the list also avoided novelty songs, and multiple songs by the same artist."We Built This City" came in at #1. According toBlendereditor Craig Marks, the choice was nearly unanimous among those who had been polled. Marks said of the song, "It purports to be anti-commercial but reeks of '80s corporate-rock commercialism. It's a real reflection of what practically killed rock music in the '80s."He referred to the line of the song "Marconi plays the mamba", asking, "Who is Marconi? And what is themamba? The mamba is the deadliest snake in the world, so he must have meant themambo, but it sounds so much like 'mamba' that every lyric website writes it that way. It makes sense neither way."TheBlenderfeature also noted the irony of the song lamenting "they're always changing corporation names", given Starship's own frequent name changes.
Asked about the listing,Mickey Thomas, one of the singers of Starship, said he was surprised at the ranking, but also "thrilled" because of the other high-profile groups on the list, saying, "I wish Blender had called us for a group shot. I'd love to have my picture taken withStevie WonderandPaul McCartney."(Wonder and McCartney were listed together at #10 for their 1982 duet "Ebony and Ivory".)Asked again about the listing in 2010, Thomas said: "From what I heard, they got so much flak about it that they sort of retracted their statements in a way about the song. And not only that, butBlender's folded, and we're still here."
Richmond Times-Dispatchmusic critic Melissa Ruggieri argued that "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" and "Sara" were Starship songs that were more suitable for the top of the list than "We Built This City", a song Ruggieri said "references Marconi, the father of the radio...inserted a cool snippet of DJ chatter from the band's beloved San Francisco...[and] found Grace Slick enunciating the phrase 'corporation games' with nutty abandon."
In 2011, aRolling Stonemagazine online readers poll named "We Built This City" the worst song of the 1980s. The song's winning margin was so large that the magazine reported it "could be the biggest blow-out victory in the history of theRolling StoneReaders Poll".
In August 2016,GQmagazine declared this song as the worst of all time, referring to it as "the most detested song in human history".The article coveredBernie TaupinandMartin Page's roles in writing an early version of the song, the song's development into its final version, its massive success and backlash, and Grace Slick's inconsistent statements about whether she liked the song.
Additional personnel
In December 2018, British bloggerLadBabyreleased a comedy version of the song with asausage rolltheme (the refrain being "We Built This City on Sausage Rolls") as a charity single whose profits went toThe Trussell Trust. It debuted at number one on theUK Singles Chart, beatingAva Max's "Sweet but Psycho" andAriana Grande's "Thank U, Next" to the 2018Christmas number one.
Americanindie rockbandCursivecovered the song in 2010 for the first season ofThe A.V. Club'sA.V. Undercoverweb series.
In 2024, a commercial for the toilet paper brandQuilted Northernparodied the song as "We Quilt This City".