Fake '50s clothes
Fake '50s food
Classic gas-guzzling dream cars
In more ads on the tube

Fake home-made cookies
Like mommy usedto make
Nostalgia for an age
That never existed

Do you remember
Art-deco knick-knacks and flings
The stars on the silver screen
Made you forget Hooverville

View the world
Through Time-Life and Nick at Nite
Nostalgia for an age
That never existed

All the stars had a pretty face
Children and Negroes knew their place
Blocks of happy families
With moms and dads all in love
Or are these wholesome memories
Really from reruns on TV
ANd ads in old garage sale magazines

Fake sixiteis
Mask our leaders' sleaze
Is it really a new beiginning
With confederate Kennedys?

Fake Camelot
Before everything went wrong
Nostalgia for an age
That never existed

Do you remember
The Summer of Love
Vietnam, mini-skirts and drugs
Rebellion was so much fun

Tell your own kids

Just Say No to that
Nostalgia for an age
That never existed

Turn that MTV racket off
So your folks can listen to "classic" rock
Mellow out to the same old songs
Again and again and again

Do you wonder or even care
How you wound up such a square
If ya can't stand the Big Chill
Get out of the freezer

Can't stand the Big Chill
Get out of the freezer

everything old is new again
It all comes back, jsut wait your turn
But somehow the magic's always missing

Giving up on future dreams
To dwell on rosy memories
Will make sure your best days
Are in the past

Nostalgia for an age that never existed
Nostalgia for an age that never existed

Do yo uremember
Being the first punk in your town
Outlaw #1
For the t-shirt you had on

Now you stay home
Mad at the whole scene
For refusing to freeze
In 1983

Why can't all the old bands reform
Stick to playing their old songs
It ain't punk
If it ain't just like the old days

That was then, this is now
Suckling up to the sacred cow
Can leave ya stuck in the mud
With its remains

Nostalgia for an age that never existed
Nostalgia for an age that never existed