Thursday 17 December 2009

70. 10 Songs about Floating in Space

Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space - Spiritualized
Do You Realize?? - Flaming Lips
Space Oddity - David Bowie
Rocket Man - Elton John
He's Simple, He's Dumb, He's the Pilot - Grandaddy
We Are All Made of Stars - Moby
Float On - Modest Mouse
Country Disappeared - Wilco
Another Girl, Another Planet - The Only Ones
Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Is In) - First Edition

It's all a bit scientific for me to write anything interesting. I'm a bit lost when it comes to anything that requires actual understanding.
Floating in space has many meanings. I've tried to avoid space as an explicit drug reference, tho failed, i suppose with the last two, and I guess, the first one. This post was created in honour of the reissue of that classic album, including the originally intended "I Can't Help Falling In Love" sample on the title track. All too beautiful.
Most of these songs have something ineffably sad about them, which i suppose you get from looking down on the Earth and the idea of just floating. The Flaming Lips and Modest Mouse have made the floating a positive thing - i think it's the best song by far for both of them. I rather like the idea in 'Do You Realize??' that in a sense you gain grounding from spacey realisations. I suppose it's just the idea that contemplation of the universe enables you to realise your own insignificance. Blah-de-blah.
i think once you've done it once you shouldn't continue to, though. Don't get lost in heaven, keep your nose to the ground etc

When the wind almost caught me
with the rope frayed and fragile
I saw you might have let me go
in kindness and impatience

You're not the first to realise
we're floating in space, my friend
I'm not the last to wonder when
it all became so precarious

We're not the first to shut our eyes
and disappear completely
Wiser men than us have tried
never to be seen again

And now I can see everything -
the hard rain and the soft clouds
and you make me fall up and down
when i think i've found my balance.

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