SONG: “First Man in Space” (cover) (To download: right-click & “Save As”)
ARTIST: grant. Originally by Jarvis Cocker (of Pulp) and Phil Oakey (of the Human League).
SOURCE: Well, it’s a penitential cover version. I was late with a song last month, and this is my penance. It doesn’t have a scientific source per se, although this fellow does make a guest performance on percussion at the 3:06 mark.
ABSTRACT: There are no guitars – no plucked or strummed strings, in fact – on this song. Nor are there any keyboards. You hear Brennan Delaney playing cello, you hear me singing and playing the sheng (hooray for Christmas! hooray for eBay!), you hear the above mentioned percussionist, and you hear a few drum loops from the mid-90s release of Acid. It is a song about space. I first heard it, as far as I know, on a very good mix CD I got earlier this year. Now the year is almost over, but I’m still looking back. If you’d like to hear the version of this song I heard while watching the band All Seeing I (with Phil Oakey) pretending to play it while wearing space suits in the 1980s, well, you’re in luck. The original is far less creepy and atonal.