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In the memorable Babylon 5 episode "War Without End" (for which spoiler alert but I will, like the character who sings this song, try to keep them vague), the alien Zathras is assigned by Cmdr. Sinclair to a time travel mission in which he is taken prisoner by Sinclair at an earlier point in the timeline. To avoid, well, spoilers, at first all Zathras will say to the earlier Sinclair is "Not the One!"

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Still the One" by Johanna Hall and John Hall

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In Vernor Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky, "Rappaport Digby" is the (translated) name of the host of the radio show "The Children's Hour of Science" on the home planet of a race of spider-like aliens. And of course that sounds just like "Eleanor Rigby", but there is also one particular episode of the show, memorable both to the Spiders themselves and to the humans surreptitiously watching them from space, which touches on some similar themes — who are we and why are we here? Do our timeless traditions still hold true in the face of the passage of time? Is anyone watching, and will anyone remember?

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Eleanor Rigby" by John Lennon and Paul McCartney

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Here's a more poetical take on generative AI's problematic tendency to just make stuff up. This is all a dream we dreamed.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: and adapted from "Box of Rain" by Robert Hunter and Phil Lesh

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One of the sensations I relish the most, that keeps me coming back to the video games that deliver it, is the feeling of zooming forward into a three-dimensional world. I'm especially a fan of science-fiction racing games, especially ones with vivid environments and tight, responsive controls. And, although the SNES wasn't the first system to do that, it was one of the first that you could bring home. The original F-Zero is still a favorite of mine, and has aged surprisingly well.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Fun, Fun, Fun" by the Beach Boys

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I'll admit, this song happened because I heard Taylor Swift's original on the radio and couldn't get the catchy chorus out of my head.

In my version, it's inspired loosely by the account, in James Gleick's book Chaos, of Edward Lorenz's discovery of sensitive dependence on initial conditions in nonlinear systems, and the realization that this effectively rules out technological weather control. Lorenz was famously soft-spoken, but for this song I've retained Taylor Swift's signature snark.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Never Ever Getting Back Together" by Taylor Swift

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Partially inspired, as are many of my songs about incidents in Faery, by true events.

lyrics and by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Hardware Store" by Weird Al Yankovic (more or less)

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This song is part nine of the song cycle Melissa Mielfée and the Omphalonian Orchid, a Harry Potter x Charlie and the Chocolate Factory fanfic.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

after "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" by Gil Scott-Heron

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The classic folk/prog rock band Jethro Tull is named for an Englishman who was in turn named for the Biblical Yitro, Moshe's father-in-law. And Yitro had some important advice for Moshe about learning to delegate. Naturally that advice needed to be worked into a Jethro Tull parody, but what to do with "Tull"? — there is no "uh" sound in Hebrew. But the soft "a" of "tal", is pretty close, and "tal" is dew, one of two kinds of precipitation which occur in the Holy Land and also figure prominently in the Jewish imagination.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman
ttto: "Jack in the Green" by Ian Anderson

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With apologies to Paul McCartney and Garth Nix. The introduction is adapted from passages in Sabriel and Lirael.

(content note: horrible things done to animals (fictional))

Gore Crows... ( Read more... )

Elvis Costello's "Veronica" is strangely peppy for a song about dementia. This parody is also about a woman who has left behind the memories that go with a name, a name that rhymes with "Veronica" — and indeed more of the vowel patterning of the original song has been preserved than is typical of my parodies.

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lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Veronica" by Elvis Costello and Paul McCartney

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People aren't the only things that turn 64 — computers do too. Will my old software still run on a 64-bit OS?

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "When I'm Sixty-Four" by John Lennon and Paul McCartney

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Väinämöinen, or Väinämö for short, is the hero of the Finnish folk epic, the Kalevala. It sounds a little like "bailamos", and once I thought of that, I couldn't unhear it.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Bailamos" by Enrique Iglesias

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The stsho are an enigmatic alien race in C. J. Cherryh's Chanur series. They are timid, conniving, decorous, and prone to changing personality and gender under stress. A background presence for most of the series, in Chanur's Legacy we finally get to meet them up close. It's surprising how much of the original Queen song survived this process...

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "The Show Must Go On" by Queen

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A hymn to Persephone.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "In the Mystery" by Joel Houston

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You can check out of this spatial anomaly any time you like, but...

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Hotel California" by the Eagles

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This song came about from playing the remastered Halo and just trying to think of songs with halos in them — this was the most obvious one.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Every Morning" by Sugar Ray

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Up all night playing Super Mario Bros. or any other video game? Trying to beat that high score? One more level? I know that feeling.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Friend of the Devil" by Robert Hunter, Jerry Garcia, and John Dawson

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A more light-hearted take on the story of Persephone.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Down Under" by Colin Hay and Ron Stryker

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I'm fortunate not to have any (known) food allergies (for now), but I have friends with serious nut allergies — this one's for you.

content warning: explicit description of serious allergy symptoms

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Addicted to Love" by Robert Palmer

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Did you fall asleep reading the Silmarillion? I'll sum it up for you — as an epic rap ballad!

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

after "It's All About the Benjamins" by Puff Daddy

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