Saturday, January 24, 2009

Hubblecast HD

Here's a bunch of nicely produced free video podcasts from the European Space Agency and Hubble. That link there will open up there page on the iTunes store so if you haven't got iTunes installed lord only knows what will happen. As it's the year of astronomy this year they've just recorded a short series on the history of the telescope. Get involved. I think I will write my backing track about Hubble after all. I keep going back to it, and it's got a nice dramatic story behind it as well.

Friday, January 23, 2009

Things, as we know, come in many sizes. This is also true in space, and spacecraft are no exception. Here's an excellent illustration that will give you some idea of how some things are small and some are big.


Thursday, January 22, 2009

In space no one can hear you play the banjo

Check the sticker on the top of his visor! It looks like Rob is taking this project VERY seriously indeed!

Great to see so many people signed up and sharing thoughts. I am feeling inspired by a recent exhibition I dragged my family round at the Vand A called Cold War Modern. It charted the impact of the space race on the design world and the political implications of the aesthetics that followed. Got me thinking about the ideology of space being hijacked by politics and the military as a topic for my track. Now, where do I go from here?

Woof

Although it has been covered before, I'm fascinated and saddened by the story of Laika, the dog the Russians blasted off into space in 1957 (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laika). As I am effectively unable to play any instruments, creating the music for this song is going to be a challenge, and I will be relying on the help of Fish studios, and drafting in Millen and Smith to help interpret the feverish and maudlin ideas that are haunting me at the moment. I may even try to find a good dog vocalist to do a performance on the track, or perhaps I should leave that wonderful part to whoever gets to do the vocals.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Monday, January 19, 2009

Hubble trouble

Well I've just watched a documentary about the Hubble telescope and all the great work it (and the people that make it work) have done to expand astronomers knowledge of the universe. Here's a link to their marvelous Hubble photo gallery.

This isn't to say that I'm going to write some music inspired by Hubble. The problem is, as Douglas Adams put it "space is big, really big" or something like that. I'm not sure where I'd start. That's what this post is about. Where do you start? I don't know whether to pick up an acoustic guitar, a synthesizer or a piano. Alright, I'm not going to pick the piano up whatever happens but I might sit near it, and plink it.

Maybe I'll play a version of rock paper scissors with hand shapes for a guitar, a piano and a synthesizer. I can't think of any other way of proceeding.

Friday, January 16, 2009








Even thought I loathe NASA - they have an awesome website full of loads of great source material, much of which is copyright free:

www.nasa.gov

...there are some really classy podcasts, and be sure to check out the multimedia tab > images.

This is an image from the Cassini spacecraft [CLICK ON IT!] The photo is taken while in the shadow of Saturn, looking back at it's eclipse of the Sun. Note the weirdly bright rings, which normally look dark against Saturn's surface. Above the rings on the left side of Saturn you can see Earth. Look closer - I'm waving.

XXX

Thursday, January 1, 2009

Dear Mars Rovers

Lyrics by Jules Peters

You droids
Rolling round mars
Like two Johnny 5s
The warmth of the sun keeping you alive

But now my boys
You’ve gotten quite old
And I must confess to you
Something that you should be told

These recent reboots just don’t seem to compute
There was no instruction from us
Erratic behavior
Flash memory failure
Stop turning my screen saver off
What’s wrong?
(what’s wrong…What on Earth’s going on?)
You don’t
Have much more time left
So if I may be bold there’s something id like to suggest
Stop testing the atmosphere looking for water
It’s probably all too deep and beyond our reach right now
And kindly perform
One last task for me

Go look for your brother I’ve told him the same
He’s heading right now for Arcadia plains
God’s speed and we thank you for all that you have done
In a few decades time with luck we may see you again
When we come

When you’ve found each other
Stay alive take cover
Find a sunny spot
And charge up and hold on if you can
Till we get you home again

Step Aside Roger Moore

Lyrics by Jimmy Binks and the Shakehorns

Born as a Kulak on collective farms
Big daddy hiding talents keeping family from harm
Relax Stalin, we're only farming
Slightly above peasants but nothing too alarming

A charming little darling
An enquiring mind
A fighter pilot teacher
An inspiring find
Relax Josef, we just want to know stuff
Follow my vocation be the hero of a nation

Who's down with triple CP
Yeah you know me
Psychological physical tests on me
And these 20 other mothers got nothing on me
Vostok's locked and
I am the key

See you later Dmitri its down to two
Both of us standing here at 5 foot 2
Tit off
Titov
No chance that’s the truth
You're too middle class and a little too aloof

We're proud of you Gagarin
G-g-going where no one has ever gone before

Yeah…Then came the day
Up up and away
Something to say to the USA
You got your sound bites but now we got some
Houston you've got a problem
I'm the sputnik chaser
Record breaker
Step aside Roger Moore I'm the real Moonraker
I'm Yuri G-G-Garin first man in space
27,000 KPH the winner of the space race

Here in space everything’s a first
Have to eat and drink but I don’t even have a thirst
Should I have a biscuit
Should you risk it
I'd rather have an egg but there is nothing here to whisk it
Look at me I’m here in space
Look at this massive smile on my face
I'm so excited and I just cant hide it

Now I’m back here on the ground
What do I do now?
I got to get back up somehow
I don’t care how
Even if it kills me I’ve just got to get back into outer space

108 minutes it was over too soon
That shlong Armstrong will get to go to the moon (moon)
Make his mark with his own 2 feet
The mark I left was a skid on my seat
Lord it's hot upon re-entry
They'll be rapping about this in the 21st century
2000 Fahrenheit and the Vostok's blazing
Christ its blue
The Earth is amazing

Seen the world
Let them know that Yuri's coming home

5 4 3 2 1 and zero
Columbus of the cosmos I'm the Kremlin's real hero
Keep your Gorbachev, Kalashnikov, Kasparov
Who's the one you think of when you hear the words blast off

We're proud of you Gagarin
G-g-going where no one has ever gone before
We're ga ga for Gagarin
G-g-going where no one has ever gone before
We're proud of you Gagarin
G-g-going where no one has ever gone before

Freeman Lowell

Lyrics by Tim Marchand

(On this first day of a new century, we humbly beg forgiveness and
dedicate these last forests of our once beautiful nation, in the hope
that they will one day return and grace our fallow Earth. Until that
day, may God bless these gardens and the brave men who care for them.)

Tragedy is no one cares
How did we get so lost?
In this synthesized wilderness?
They say there is no more disease
No more poverty
No one's out of a job
But do you know my friend?
That's not the end of it
Cause she is never going to see the simple wonder of a leaf in her hand

I cant believe they'd do it
Cant believe they'd blow it all away
Take Mother nature's greatest gift
And throw it back in her face
When supplements are meals
Then a cantaloupe just stinks
And you cant even tell the difference
How pitiful
Coz everything's the same
If all the people are exactly the same
Now what kind of life is that?
What kind of living is that?

Used to be
Flowers growing all over the Earth
And there were plains of tall green grass
And blue skies and even fresh air
But now it's all...it's all become the same
The beauty of a forest
The simple wonder of a leaf
These things have been forgotten
I don't think you understand
What is lost is not replaceable
What is lost is gone

Can't let them do it
Let them blow it all away
Take Mother Nature's greatest gifts
And throw them back in her face
Coz everything's the same
When everyone's the same
Well what kind of life is that?
Pitiful

A forest in a dome
Iguana and the toad
Rabbits running free
Swimming in a stream
Drones planting trees
The beauty of a leaf
Cantaloupe just stinks
Dried synthetic crap
75b degrees
Tall green grass
Robots playing cards
Tortoise and the hawk
Sleeping in the grass
She is never going to see
Its not too late
Everything's the same
No imagination
Its not too late
Don't throw it away
Everyone's the same
No frontiers left
Its not too late
Its not too late
Its not too late

I had to do it
Couldn't let them blow it all away
And don't think that I'll ever
Excuse what I did
I've taught you everything
Everything I know
I had to do it
I had to let it go

(God bless you Freeman, you are a hell of an American)
(Thank you Sir, I think I am)

Russian Man Outside

Lyrics by Barney Brown and Kip Loades

I can see Yuri’s house from here
The shadows on his lawn
The dawn is on St Petersburg
And I’m above the dawn

I think there’s something wrong about the way that maps are drawn there’s something wrong, so wrong
Perhaps because I float within a vacuum far from earth

I ought to start to start my space walk now
But does it matter how
No man has passed this way before
I stride on heaven’s floor

Returning to the ship will be the thing that I can do when I am done, so done
My tether, my umbilicus, my mother ship stay true

And so 12 minutes gone I think it’s time that I went back oh God I’m stuck (so stuck)

So, in the event you get stuck
Vent, excessive air from your suit, or you'll die
Now, I know I want to go home

Laika

Lyrics by Layla Vandenbergh

Missile tech is what we did
Went to space with first Sputnik
Khruschev decreed a space spectacular
Celebrate the revolution

Cold slums of Moscow, your only known home
Oh Laika, small comrade, come help, help win this race

We took mongrels from the street
Should be used to survival feats
Put in boxes ever smaller
How many days can you stay in Laika?
Ever obedient, perfect citizen
Perfect trainee little Muttnik
Iodine spots mark the sensors
Suited, strapped. To the Cosmodrome

You blasted, your heart raced, you could not calm down
Oh Laika, you circled the Earth in weightlessness

Look at us Americos, Soviet victorious!

Confinement and centrifuge
In the lab did not prepare for this
Sit quiet if you can, forget the chains and calm that heart
Agitated but more restful now
In orbit, mission cleared
Damaged craft, loss of protection
Heating up now, how long can this last

Temperature rising, elliptical sway
Oh Laika, you gave all you had and faded away

Our world desire for space supremacy
The dogma, oh Laika, your life, it’s your legacy

You led the way for safer flight
The only one we sent to die
In our hearts, comrade respect
Have we learnt enough Kudryavka?
You paved the way for safer flight
The only one we left to die
In all our hearts, comrade respect
Sweet little Laika now we regret

Dave

Lyrics by Bob Rocket

Warmth is dissipating as we travel from the sun
Interest's relocating as nothing new happens
Thirty days is all it takes to disconnect the past

Jupiter's chaotic roar stems the silence and routine
And the farther we are carried forth, our focus intensifies
To maintain connection with our shrinking star, we've never been as far

Sabotage is born of half a billion miles of burden
For secrets weigh as heavy on man's misjudged machine
No one could anticipate he'd be the first to panic

Born out of desire to champion the mind
Intelligence aspires to weave itself in kind
Now it's time to cut the line, the program's run its course
We'll redesign and we'll give rebirth

Through star fields, past globular clusters
And junkyards of discarded vessels
Faced with inconceivable fate, I draw courage from reason, from logic
I am beyond hope and despair

Sleep recalls the hard black slab standing tall once more [at the foot of the bed]
The simplicity of its shape belieing its perfect construction
I am emptied and filled with senses more subtle than vision, a new conciousness
Necessities of matter will dissolve, the child is reborn

Born out of desire, to champion the mind
Intelligence aspires, to weave itself in kind
Now it's time to cut the line, the program's run its course
We'll redesign and we'll give rebirth

The second dawn of man, races from afar
Master of the world but child of the stars

That's The Worm's Game

Lyrics by Nick Osbourne and Richard Yates

Agujero de gusano
El insecto, mi hermano
Agujero de gusano
Te quiero, mi hermano

Llenaré su garganta de materia exótica
Y seré un fantasma en el pasado
Pero te prometo
¡No voy matar a mi abuelo!

Vacuum fluctuations during transportation could annihilate your hole
The worm would rather you be your own father than remake broken bones
Don’t be your child!
If you even make it past the tonsils
You’ll be squeezed like spunk from an onion (I’m all fucking shook up!)

There’s a light in the hole
But the worm will only fold
You’ll be left with monkey egg on your face
Or in 1442 you might invent chicken soup
And your father will be poisoned by the same
That’s the worm’s game

Wonderful
Oh darling you’re wonderful
And I want you to know the truth
As I go through the wormhole

But I want you to know that Nature hates your kind
And so devised the Chronology Protection Agency

Todo es gusano, Elvis
Abre los brazos, Elvis
No es peligroso, cariño
Quiero el pasado
Todos hombres enterrados
Las palabras, las bebidas, cariño
¡No, Elvis, no!

Debo hallarme en el pasado mañana mismo
Y jugaré con la luz de un universo paralelo
¡Sígame, Elvis, sígame!
Dentro el agujero de gusano
¿Para quién es la paella con pollo?

And in the tunnel there’ll be fourteen visions
That will come and go
And the very last will be death … death with your mother’s face on it

There’s a devil in the worm
So that when you take your turn
He will crush you like a winkle in a vice
Or in 1893 you might shoot Butch Cassidy
But then perish of a bee sting on the plains
That’s the worm’s game

¿Cuánto tiempo lleva aquí, Elvis?
Lo siento, no hablo español
Pero me gusta … ¿hamburgers?
!Hamburgers!

The Burning Man

Lyrics by Dan Waldkirch

Gully Foyle is my name
And Terra is my nation
Deep space is my dwelling place
And death's my destination.

I see a shape against the black
Surely the Vorga hears my cry
They’ll find me here and bring me back
Surely they cannot let me die
Don’t let me die.

Gully Foyle is my name
And Terra is my nation
Deep space is my dwelling place
The stars my destination

I’ve felt the fires of the sun
I’ve seen the writing on the wall
All of their pain might be undone
If they had listened to my call.
I’ll kill them all.

I’ll kill them all!

Lonely Planets Club

Lyrics by Dan Waldkirch

She invited me in
She gave me a name
Then she left me spinning on my side
As she walked out the door
She said “I always knew
That we couldn’t make it,
But we tried.”

If you’re feeling cold
If you’re feeling far away
Well then we’ve got a space for you

Why?
So maybe I’m small
So maybe I don’t have much to say
But since you ‘ve been gone
It’s been harder to see
But it’s always been dark here anyway

Lonely Planets Club
We know just how much it hurts
So come in and have a drink or two

You’ve turned my heart
To ice and stone
So far apart
I’m on my own
Pick up the phone

Oh baby girl
It hasn’t been long
I’ve already found somebody new
She’s got a nice belt
And it’s just a short drive
And she understands me, unlike you

If you’re feeling blue
Keep on spinning anyway
Cause together we can make it through

Lonely Planets Club
Everything will be OK
All because I fell in love with you.

Droids (gonna rock this mothership)

Lyrics by Greg Dean

It’s your captain speaking, welcome aboard,
Check your oil, check your circuit boards,
We got a rendezvous at 11 o clock
And yeah that’s earth time baby and its time to rock.
We’re gonna get down everybody,
To the breakdown everybody
All my droids on the floor, robots give me more.
Robo DJ can I get a
1234

Mama always told me, don’t hang round with those droids.
And others always told me, what’s wrong with normal girls and boys.

Bridge
(oooooooh) Droids just wanna get down (yeah)
(oooooooh) When you’re working 9 to 5,
Party just to feel alive.

Chorus
(Droids droids) we only wanna party,
Lock the hatches gonna rock this mothership
(Droids doids), we’re only getting started,
Hit your switches gonna stay on target,
(Droids droids) just a little naughty,
Bolt the hatches gonna blow this mothership
(Droids droids) We only wanna party,

Party all night long,
Party all night long,

Shakedown, it’s a takedown, to the breakdown.

Daddy always told me,
Daddy always told me,

One look behind those gleaming eyes,
And rust corrodes from every side,
And whosoever shall be fooled,
Will rot inside a space capsule.

Bridge
Chorus

From every server machine to any type of droid,
We got the aliens, the robots and humanoids,
Any weather get together just to have a good time,
Droids’ll rock a party like its 2099
ET phone home, its time to rock the microphone,
Beats like a metronome, mixing like a chromosome,
Set your party program to the break of dawn,
We’re gonna party all night, party all night long.

Party, all night long,
We just wanna party, all night long
(Repeat to end)

Voyager

Lyrics by Craig Macintosh

Is 'Rumours' still at number one?
Is 'Annie' still the Broadway queen?
Do cowboys and sailors still dance - disco to John Williams themes?

Well it's moved on and on and on and on...

What about air disaters and Isreal?
Still dropping bombs? Kiss, lie and tell? - within a pale blue dot.

Some distance away never wondering how, as you fly

As you fly away from here
How the beat of this heart
Beats with you even though we are billions of miles apart.

But how's a big surprise supposed to rise?
You make it through - close your eyes and wonder how, and wow it on
How it feels to pass beyond the ice storms of Jupiter
Across the oceans Eupora holds
Around the rings slings and throw you on
This is a pale blue dot that wonders
To wonder if wonder were gone.

A bitter cold and it's so dark
Nothing feels and nothing moves
Just punching numbers in
It's only for you that I fly
That I fly away
Ten billion miles apart

If I knew what I was doing
If I knew that I helped.

VRG 31. OWLT AT TIME SET. 10 DEGREES. OWLT AT TIME SET. AOS.
VRG 31. OWLT AT TIME SET. 10 DEGREES. OWLT AT TIME SET. AOS.
VRG 31. OWLT AT TIME SET. 10 DEGREES. OWLT AT TIME SET. AOS....

OUT.

Klaatu Barada Nikto

Lyrics by Joseph Ashley-Smith

We come in peace and goodwill
With a message for your world
You've got to come together
If you wanna hear me say what I came to tell you

The future of your planet is at stake
You'll have to put aside your fears
'Cause tensions and suspicions do not serve
To endear you to the other worlds

Oh everybody's saying
You'll never find a way to keep the Earth from straying
Soon it's gonna be too late
You've got no time to waste
You'll forever be left down here

This world is all you have
Don't throw it all away

Do I have to stop the world
For you to see
That violence is not the way
The situations never been as bad
As it is today, it is today, it is today

We come in peace and goodwill
With a message for your world
You've got to come together
If you wanna hear me say what I came to tell you

The future of your planet is at stake
You'll have to put aside your fears
'Cause tensions and suspicions do not serve
To endear you to the other worlds

Oh everybody's saying
You'll never find a way to keep the Earth from straying
Soon it's gonna be too late
You've got no time to waste
You'll forever be left down here

This world is all you have
Don't throw it all away
You're not alone in outer space
This world is all you have
You'll only have yourselves to blame
Don't throw it all away

Probe II's Golden Message

Lyrics by Kip Loades

If anyone is out there
we have a message for you
it's on a golden record
so you can get to know Earth
in case you ever find it
well we may well be long dead
but you will know we were alive

My name is Voyager II
and I've got alot to tell you
I have seen a few things in my time
I am an unmanned space probe
on a Planetary Grand Tour
and I radio back what I find

On Jupiter I probed alot
I even probed its Great Red Spot
which was a complex storm
and it was info-porn
I thought my circuits would be shot

If anyone is out there
we have a message for you
it's on a golden record
so you can get to know Earth
in case you ever find it
well we may well be long dead
but you will know we were alive

Saturn was a cold spot
and the camera platform locked up
when I probed the upper atmosphere
I probed Neptune's dark spot
and I measured what its mass was
what was once obscure now is clear

The next stop was my greatest high
I probed Uranus for the first time
I found the strangest things
probing into the ring
Uranus was a wild ride

If anyone is out there
we have a message for you
it's on a golden record
so you can get to know Earth
in case you ever find it
well we may well be long dead
but you will know we were alive

Hello there
we're out here
we've got a message for you
Hello there
we're out here
it would be nice to know you