Is That All There Is?

"Is That All There Is?" is a song written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller and recorded by Peggy Lee in 1969.

It was a popular single, reaching number 11 on the U.S. pop singles chart - becoming Peggy Lee's first Top 40 pop hit since "Fever," 11 years earlier - and doing even better on the adult contemporary scene, topping that "Billboard" chart. It won Lee the Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, and then later was named to the Grammy Hall of Fame.

Lyrics

The lyrics of this existentialist song are written from the point of view of a person who is disillusioned with events in life that are supposed unique experiences. The singer tells the story of when she saw her family's house on fire when she was a little girl, when she saw the circus and when she fell in love for the first time. After each story, she expresses her disappointment in each experience. She suggests that we "break out the booze and have a ball — if that's all — there is", instead of worrying about life. She also explains that she'll never kill herself either because she knows that death will be a disappointment as well.

Inspiration

The song was inspired by the story "Disillusionment" by Thomas Mann, written in 1896. The narrator in Mann's story tells the same stories of when he was a child.

One difference between the story and the song is that the narrator in Mann's story finally has a sensation to feel free when he sees the sea for the first time and laments for a sea without a horizon. Most of the lyrics of the chorus are actually spoken in the story.

Cover versions

This song has been covered by assorted artists, including Chaka Khan, Bette Midler, Sandra Bernhard, P.J. Harvey, Alan Price and Firewater. An altered version by No Wave singer Cristina in 1980 offended songwriters Leiber and Stoller, who sued and were able to get it suppressed for some time. In 2008, the song was covered by the duo of jazz singer Kate and composer Mike Westbrook; it was featured on their CD, "The Westbrook Songbook". Bette Midler covered this song for her Peggy Lee tribute album "Bette Midler Sings the Peggy Lee Songbook".

Other appearances

*The song is featured prominently in the 1985 film "After Hours" and the 2007 film "The Nines".
* The HBO miniseries "From the Earth to the Moon" episode entitled "That's All There Is" dramatized a portion of the Apollo 12 mission. The song is referenced as the crew prepares to leave lunar orbit when the LM Pilot Alan Bean (Dave Foley) remarks, "I kind of feel like that song. Is that all there is?"
*The HBO comedy program "Sex and the City" Season 5, Episode 8: "I Love a Charade" uses the song as an allegory for each character as a song in the final scene of the season finale at the wedding of Bobby Fine (Nathan Lane) & Bitsy von Muffling (Julie Halston).
*In a twelfth season episode of "The Simpsons", "Children of a Lesser Clod", Rod and Todd Flanders ask Homer to sing them "that crazy song" they love, and Homer sings the beginning verse of this song.
*It was also (if slightly obliquely) referred to by civil-rights activist Del Martin in her groundbreaking article "If That's All There Is".