bnewman: (guitar)
[personal profile] bnewman posting in [community profile] bn_songbook
"Your State's Name Here", by the Berrymans, abstracts over all US states. Parodies of it have been written abstracting over other categories — sci-fi cons in "Your Con's Name Here", crooked politicians in "Your Crook's Name Here", etc. This song abstracts over all categories, and thus all parodies of the original song. I think this is about as meta as a song can get without collapsing.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman
ttto: "Your State's Name Here" by Lou and Peter Berryman

/ G - C G / C G (C) D / 1st / C G D G /
 
Sometimes when I think about [things of some kind]
My own seems unique, but then later I find
The features that make my [noun] special to me
Apply to all others about equally
 
I pick up my guitar when I want to point out
The sameness of [whatever we're talking about]
There's a song that expresses that feeling so clear:
It's called "Your [your topic's name here]'s Name Here"
 
/ D - - G / / " / " /
 
Oh, [your topic's name here]s, every one is the same
However they differ, they all share a frame
Where the blanks can be filled in to make each appear
Just like (your [your topic's name here]'s name here)
 
(Your [your topic's name here]), sure, we've all heard the hype
About its [some feature of things of that type]
Its [adjective] [noun] [verb] so [adverb] you must
Insist that it leaves other [noun] in the dust
 
But however it's special, we find, if we try
That much the same words can be made to apply
To every last [noun again] in the array
By abstracting irrelevant details away
 
Oh, [your topic's name here]s, every one is the same...
 
All [things of some kind], when considered en masse
Form what's called a type, category, or class
Which defines all the structures and features they share
If you look, pretty soon you'll see types everywhere
 
Types, too, form a type, but a type that's much better
'Cause anything things can do, types can do meta
I would mention them, too, if I thought that I'd missed 'em
But a song that abstract would collapse the whole system
 
Oh, [your topic's name here]s, every one is the same...
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