Big Yellow Taxi by Joni Mitchell

Genre: Pop

Length: 2:14

Released: 1970

“Big Yellow Taxi” is Joni Mitchell’s call to action to prevent the damage we are doing to our planet. It refers to lack of human awareness; only too late we recognise the profligate destruction done to the environment. We value what we have in retrospect. Another dimension to this song appears in the final verse. A further loss may be the singer’s lover who leaves in the yellow taxi. It implies that she was careless with the relationship, but understood too late the irretrievable damage she...

Big Yellow Taxi lyrics

They paved paradise, put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique, and a swingin' hot spot
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot
(Ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop, ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop)
They took all the trees put 'em in a tree museum
And they charged the people a dollar an' a half just to see 'em
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot
(Ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop, ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop)
Hey farmer, farmer put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples, but leave me the birds and the bees
Please
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot
(Ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop, ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop)
Late last night I heard the screen door slam
And a big yellow taxi took away my old man
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot (ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop) ( ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop))
I said don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot (ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop) ( ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop))
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot (ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop) ( ooh, bop-bop-bop-bop))
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot