We Have Been Here Before

This track was born from a real headline: Historical comparison of 2026 gas crisis to 2022 spike and previous oil shocks. The lyrics weave in verified details — 2022 spike peaked at $5.02 national average in June 2022; 2026 crisis worse in speed: 26 percent rise in 16 days vs months in 2022; 1973 Arab oil embargo quadrupled prices from $3 to $12 per barrel. Majik delivers the report through lo-fi, letting the data hit as hard as the beat. Lines like "Nineteen seventy-three, the Arab oil embargo hit," anchor the track in specifics that generic coverage misses. The mood — reflective, educational, melancholy — reflects the emotional reality behind the numbers. Every Majik's Studio news track exists to make you feel the story, not just read it.

[verse 1] Nineteen seventy-three, the Arab oil embargo hit, crude went from three dollars to twelve, the world split. Prices quadrupled in the span of half a year, gas lines wrapped around the block, rationing and fear. Then seventy-nine, the Iranian revolution came, oil doubled again to thirty-nine, a different name. Same Strait of Hormuz, same geopolitics of crude, same working families paying for the feud. Two thousand and eight, gas hit four-eleven nationwide, oil at one-forty-seven a barrel, nowhere to hide. Then the market crashed and prices fell back down, but the damage to the working class had drowned the town. [chorus] We have been here before, seventy-three, oh-eight, twenty-two, and more. We have been here before, but twenty-six hit faster than any war. We have been here before, the numbers change, the pain is at the core. We have been here before, remember every price from every floor. [verse 2] June twenty-twenty-two, five-oh-two a gallon peak, Russia-Ukraine conflict made the oil market bleak. That spike took months to climb from three-fifty to the top, but twenty-six went two-ninety-three to three-seventy and will not stop. Twenty-six percent in sixteen days, the fastest climb on file, two thousand twenty-two took ninety days to reach that style. Now add the groceries, eight to twelve percent on top of fuel, combined burden, fifty-four hundred extra per household, cruel. In twenty-two the grocery spike was six-point-five percent, in twenty-six it nearly doubled, where did the paycheck went. Worst combined gas and food cost burden since the data starts, working families spending thirty-three percent of income on these parts. [chorus] We have been here before, seventy-three, oh-eight, twenty-two, and more. We have been here before, but twenty-six hit faster than any war. We have been here before, the numbers change, the pain is at the core. We have been here before, remember every price from every floor. [bridge] Seventy-three, three to twelve a barrel, seventy-nine, oil doubled to thirty-nine in peril. Oh-eight, four-eleven at the pump, one-forty-seven crude, twenty-two, five-oh-two a gallon, attitude. Twenty-six, three-seventy in sixteen days flat, fastest spike in fifty years, imagine that. Every crisis same lesson, same refrain, the ones who pump the oil do not feel the pain. [chorus] We have been here before, seventy-three, oh-eight, twenty-two, and more. We have been here before, but twenty-six hit faster than any war. We have been here before, the numbers change, the pain is at the core. We have been here before, remember every price from every floor. [outro] We have been here before. Seventy-three. Seventy-nine. Oh-eight. Twenty-two. Twenty-six. We have been here before.