The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire – was written ""with a tiny bit of cribbin' / from the works of Edward Gibbon"". In 1995, an established journal of classical scholarship, "Classics Ireland", published punk musician's Iggy Pop's reflections on the applicability of "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" to the modern world in a short article, "Caesar Lives", (vol. 2, 1995) in which he notedAmerica is Rome. Of course, why shouldn't it be? We are all Roman children, for better or worse ... I learn much about the way our society really works, because the system-origins – military, religious, political, colonial, agricultural, financial –
Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire) accompanying LP. Agreements were finalised on 8 January, but the project was not revealed until a press release on 10 March. Separately, the Kinks began work on the programme's companion record, entitled "Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire)". Development of "Arthur" occurred during a rough period for the band, due to the commercial failure of their previous album "The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society" and the subsequent single, "Plastic Man", as well as the departure of founding member and bassist Pete Quaife. In early 1969, Quaife had told the band he was quitting, though