Why have I never heard of Jonny Berliner before?
I somehow found him through Null Hypothesis. His music’s not for everyone… but how can you resist a song about dark matter?
Here are the lyrics if you want to keep up at home, too.
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Phil Plait, the creator of Bad Astronomy, is an astronomer, lecturer, and author. After ten years working on Hubble Space Telescope and six more working on astronomy education, he struck out on his own as a writer. He has written two books, dozens of magazine articles, and 12 bazillion blog articles. He is a skeptic, and fights misuses of science as well as praising the wonder of real science.
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May 1st, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Wouldn’t a song about dark matter be silent? Maybe I meant dark energy.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:40 pm
Wow.
A song about science.
May 1st, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Hey this guy is a regular on the Guardian Science Podcast - get yourself on that BA!
James Randerson is a creationist crunching angry man of science who might appreciate your bad universe.
Regards,
Psi
May 1st, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Reminds me of Tom Waits’ Singapore in tone and style. I like it!
May 1st, 2008 at 2:47 pm
I’m more fascinated by the 80’s pop group - “Dalek I love you”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dalek_I_Love_You
May 1st, 2008 at 3:04 pm
[…] Bad Astronomy (Via Null […]
May 1st, 2008 at 3:18 pm
Is he a donut?
May 1st, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Laguna2
Wow.
A song about science.
Check out the songs of They Might Be Giants (the band, not the movie, but I personallly like both). I did a quick mention of BA being ‘a star’ and there was a link that directly related (No, I am NOT going to look it up, I just got home from work/shopping/etc. and want to go to bed)
J/P=?
May 1st, 2008 at 3:34 pm
If you like songs about science, try AstroCappella at http://www.astrocappella.com/
Their song about the SWIFT observatory is at:
http://www.astrocappella.com/swift.shtml
They have a link to the left to play the song.
Other songs are about all things “space” such as the solar system, hubble, doppler shift, habital zones, etc.
It’s a music group with an agenda, but an agenda that would go over well with what I expect the readership of this site has.
May 1st, 2008 at 3:39 pm
@Centipede: Maybe a Jelly roll?
May 1st, 2008 at 3:58 pm
JackC:
No, two very different things: a jam-injected donut isn’t a rolled jam flatcake.
He’d only be a donut outside of Berlin, though.
May 1st, 2008 at 4:37 pm
Other sciencey songs
“Critical Mass” by Threshold
“Natural Science” by Rush
Most of the album “Universal Migrator Part 2: Flight of the Migrator”, by Ayreon, a science fantasy concept album. If you like progressive rock, you will love this album along with Part 1.
And, of course, “The Elements Song” by Tom Lehrer, which is basically the periodic table set to music.
“… and Thorium and Thallium and Thulium!”
May 1st, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Nice. A good blend of science geekery and musical talent. The song would be worth recommending to any blues fan, despite their science background.
(Insert obligatory plug for the geeky musical stylings of Jonathan Coulton. Anyone who can sing a ballad about Pluto losing its status is worth checking out. http://jonathancoulton.com )
May 1st, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Q_D:And, of course, “The Elements Song” by Tom Lehrer, which is basically the periodic table set to music.
“… and Thorium and Thallium and Thulium!”
I can hum it, but NEVER could memorize the lyrics
J/P=?
May 1st, 2008 at 6:12 pm
You learn something every day if you have your eyes open. Something that the creationists, moon hoaxers, etc should take to heart. I’m wondering why no one ever told me about Lyman alpha blobs. I just found out about them the other day. :^(
May 1st, 2008 at 6:13 pm
Oh, and by the way, what is clicking on the “#” by our names supposed to do?
(something else to learn) ;^)
May 1st, 2008 at 6:22 pm
“And then it opened up a can of worms
About why the Universe is still expanding
It’s a dark, dark matter”
Is not the accelerating expanding universe due to dark energy, not dark matter?
May 1st, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Mena asked:
Oh, and by the way, what is clicking on the “#” by our names supposed to do?
One thing it apparently is not is the way to post a reply to a specific comment . . .
May 1st, 2008 at 6:43 pm
Centipede: I rushed, I meant to say jelly doughnut. Or, as my great uncle used to say - do (ugh!) nut. But - point taken. Not sure why I quickly typed “jellyroll”
Wikipedia says it is an urban legend, but I have German friends. They have said that basically, the folks at the time were just too refined to lough out loud. They probably knew what he meant.
JC
May 1st, 2008 at 6:46 pm
John Paradox says: “Q_D:And, of course, “The Elements Song” by Tom Lehrer, which is basically the periodic table set to music.
“… and Thorium and Thallium and Thulium!”
I can hum it, but NEVER could memorize the lyrics”
That’s OK; Quiet_D got Thallium and Thulium reversed anyway.
- Jack
May 1st, 2008 at 6:47 pm
Mena
I am guessing here - having just tried it - but if you click it, the link in the URL area changes to the specific comment - so if you imbed it in here thus:
http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2008/05/01/its-a-dark-dark-matter/#comment-171762
it will take you in the link to precisely that comment - in this case, yours.
I probably did that as inelegantly as possible. I am not well versed in messing with the quoting system within this blog.
JC
May 1st, 2008 at 7:13 pm
If only the lecturers of the world would take note and copy to form!
May 1st, 2008 at 7:33 pm
What about Cygnus X-1? A song about flying a spaceship into a black hole from Rush!
May 1st, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Mena
Oh, and by the way, what is clicking on the “#” by our names supposed to do?
Actually, doesn’t really do anything other than ‘mark’ the comment, like the < A NAME=”(enter link name here)”> link to a specific part of a page. Here’s what displays on the ’status bar’ of your browser:
http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2008/05/01/its-a-dark-dark-matter/#comment-171762
J/P=? HTML guru extraordinaire
May 2nd, 2008 at 12:28 am
Or, if you like the slightly eerie sounds of ambience, you could check out Perpetual Ocean’s Strangeness + Charm — Vol 1 is called “Brilliant Particles”. (www.perpetualocean.com)
May 2nd, 2008 at 3:02 am
[…] Bron: Bad Astronomy. […]
May 2nd, 2008 at 8:13 am
Have you never heard the “Dark Matter Rap” by David Weinberg?
http://www.astronomy.ohio-state.edu/~dhw/Silliness/silliness.html
I once got treated to a live performance by Prof. Weinberg himself. There’s nothing quite like it.
May 2nd, 2008 at 8:36 am
“I can hum it, but NEVER could memorize the lyrics”
In highschool, I once used it to get a question right on a chemistry test.
… and Jack’s right, QD did transpose Thulium and Thallium.
May 2nd, 2008 at 11:30 am
Thanks guys, that makes a world of sense. I probably looked kind of funny (at least to the cat) clicking on those things and seemingly staying in the same place on the page. :^)
May 2nd, 2008 at 3:19 pm
The amazingly talented multi-instrumentalist Andrew Bird has a song called “Dark Matter”: http://youtube.com/watch?v=QAGyAcjijmY
It’s more about his fascination with science rather than dark matter itself, but it’s amazing.
May 13th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Hey, if any of you guys know more sci-poppers (preferably unsigned ones that we can give more exposure to) send them our way. We’re doing a Sci-Pop Singles column on Mondays.
news@null-hypothesis.co.uk