HUGO AWARD-WINNING SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY MAGAZINE
Moonage Daydream:
The Rock Album as Science Fiction
Rock 'n' roll was never intended to have a future. Hot, fast, loud, bright: the genre was made to be as disposable as the chemically-fueled rockets that had started putting objects into orbit just as rock was getting off the ground in the '50s.
It's perhaps more than coincidence that the song generally considered to be the first rock 'n' roll tune was titled "Rocket 88" — a scorching instrumental by Ike Turner that, granted, was ostensibly an ode to an Oldsmobile. Still, even today the song takes off in a burst of fiery glory, one that most listeners back in the '50s surely assumed would destroy itself in a puff of faddish obsolescence.
Of course, what "Rocket 88" — and rock 'n' roll in general — really did was this: open up a jagged, flaming path into the world of tomorrow.
Science fiction served a similar purpose in the '50s. Having vaulted from the fringes of pop culture into the mainstream after a newly atomic America became obsessed with films about mutants and aliens, SF literature matured and flowered throughout the '60s and beyond, just as rock 'n' roll did the same. It was inevitable that the two would mix. And although plenty of random rock songs in the '60s were fixated on SF themes — including The Byrds' "Mr. Spaceman" from 1966 and "Space Odyssey" from 1968, not to mention Pink Floyd's groundbreaking "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun," also from 1968 — it was David Bowie's "Space Oddity" in 1969 that really sealed the deal.
Of course, Bowie would also be the artist to put the SF concept album on the map in the '70s. Full albums, after all, are much better vessels for SF's sprawling tropes. Since then, some bands have tried making bona fide, SF rock operas. Less ambitious groups have settled for loose concepts — many dystopian — for songs to revolve around. And some simply use the flash and fantasy of SF as a backdrop to their own warped vision of the future.
Below are a few of the most intriguing SF-themed records launched at the unsuspecting public since Bowie made his first foray into the concept album. While many rock albums — like The Alan Parson Project's I Robot or Golem's Dune-based The 2nd Moon — base their narratives to some degree around existing SF works, the list below sticks with original concepts: the fevered output of a few dozen buzzing brains addled by feedback, distortion, beats, drugs and, of course, the ever-morphing futurism of science fiction.
David Bowie, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972)
For a record that launched a thousand bloated, SF-centric concept albums, David Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars is pretty concise — especially considering that title. In 38 minutes of apocalyptic surrealism rooted in the warped SF of Samuel R. Delany and William S. Burroughs, Ziggy Stardust tells the melancholic yet rapturous tale of a rock 'n' roll alien who comes to Earth during the five years prior to the apocalypse. While never matching his sweep and scope, other glam-rock artists of the era — including Roxy Music, T. Rex, the doomed American singer Jobraith, and even Elton John with his hit "Rocket Man" — would share Bowie's love for glittery, gender-bending SF. After all, what's more androgynous than a spacesuit?
Hawkwind, Space Ritual (1973)
Progressive rock is synonymous with the concept album, but surprisingly few bands of the '70s prog movement actually made SF concept albums (Yes' unfocused yet excellent Tales from Topographic Oceans being a notable exception). The idiosyncratic Hawkwind was never entirely a prog band, but frontman Dave Brock and crew (which featured a pre-Motörhead Lemmy on bass) took their primal, interdimensional drone to its apex with Space Ritual. A double album that approximates what space travel might sound like if astronauts flew around in bong-shaped ships, Space Ritual even has some real SF credentials. Legendary author Michael Moorcock, a regular Hawkwind collaborator, delivers a metaphysical spoken-word piece titled "Black Corridor" — which just goes to show that his stentorian voice is just as grandiloquent in reality as it in on the page.
Parliament, Mothership Connection (1975)
"A pimp sitting in a spaceship shaped like a Cadillac" is the overall vibe George Clinton said he was aiming for with Mothership Connection, his masterpiece as the leader of the funk collective known as Parliament. Making Bowie and his brethren look downright bland by comparison, Clinton and company amped up the psychedelic, satirically cartoonish edge of Kurt Vonnegut's SF work (whether they realized it or not). The result is a cyberfunk phantasmagoria that refurbishes the interstellar void as a vast, cosmic dancefloor. Clinton continues to man the Mothership to this day, but this album is where he invented Funkier Than Light travel.
Rush, 2112 (1976)
Although this list is meant to focus on original works of SF music, it's hard to dismiss Rush's 2112 as a mere adaptation, despite the fact that it borrows blatantly from Ayn Rand's novel Anthem as well as two episodes — "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" and "Stopover in a Quiet Town" — of The Twilight Zone. In fact the latter example is even titled "The Twilight Zone." But there's no denying that Rush's drummer and lyricist, Neil Peart, folded his SF influences into a unique and stunning work of sustained imagination that pairs the cosmic, dystopian, multi-suite epic "2112" with excellent yet unconnected tracks that showcase the band's prog chops, celestial melody, and philosophical waxing. Oh, and it rocks, too.
Gary Numan and Tubeway Army, Replicas (1979)
Glam, punk, and the robotic tones of Germany's groundbreaking electronic group Kraftwerk came together in the late '70s to form the basis of much of the new wave movement. But before bands like Duran Duran could chew that sound up into bubblegum in the '80s, some truly edgy artists mined that dark sonic domain — one of the greatest being Gary Numan. His second album with Tubeway Army, Replicas, picks up on many of Philip K. Dick's themes of alienation and self-negation in the wake of runaway technology. He wasn't alone; at the same time Replicas was released, everyone from Klaus Nomi to Frank Zappa was using rock music to riff on androids as symbols of our dwindling humanity. Replicas' bleak depiction of artificial intelligence and metaphysical estrangement should be considered not only great pop music, but part of the cultural groundswell that resulted in the 1982 film, Bladerunner (Dick again, and “replicants”), and the cyberpunk explosion soon after.
Styx, Kilroy Was Here (1983)
Styx wasn't the first mainstream '70s rock band to tinker with SF after the '80s hit — ELO beat them to it by two years with 1981's alien-abduction parable, Time — but Styx set the standard for both excellence and excess with Kilroy Was Here. Capitalizing on the buildup to 1984, one of the most infamous years in the SF canon, Kilroy is singer-keyboardist Dennis DeYoung's over-the-top masterpiece. A rock 'n' roll dystopia, it casts the oppressed rocker Kilroy as Winston Smith from George Orwell's 1984, and the fascist leader Dr. Righteous as Big Brother. Bowie, of course, had already harvest Orwell's most famous novel for his 1974 album Diamond Dogs, but Kilroy was a symphonic, synthesizer-soaked update for the Moral Majority era. Really, though, it all boils down to the album's indelible hit single, "Mr. Roboto," a song that's more or less a rock opera unto itself.
Jonzun Crew, Lost in Space (1983)
While much of the SF community — and the world at large — debated just how close the real world was coming to resemble that of Orwell's 1984, Jonzun Crew figured partying might be a healthier reaction. Picking up where George Clinton's P-Funk crew left off (not that P-Funk ever really stopped), Jonzun Crew was part of an entire electro movement that married hardcore synthesizers and hip-hop into a sleek, chilling, yet wholly fun music. Granted, some electro groups like Time Zone and Cybotron were a bit gloomier, but Jonzun Crew's SF-steeped Lost in Space struck the perfect balance between the nightmare of the future and the hangover of tomorrow.
Planet P Project, Pink World (1984)
Double albums were pretty much a dim memory of the '70s in the slim, trim world of 1984. And yet Tony Carey's Planet P Project decided that year was when the massive, 26-song Pink World needed to be unleashed. It failed to make the mark he'd hoped, but the album's cult status persists, and for good reason. Although taking the name of his project from Planet P in Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers, Carey — like the SF world itself in 1984 — had focused past the trite, tired tropes of space opera and tapped into the terrifying realms of inner space and the near future. Mixing the iciness of new wave with the chops, pomp, and circumstance of prog, Pink World remains a dizzying and literate SF vision.
Queensrÿche, Operation: Mindcrime (1988)
The spacefaring Hawkwind inspired many of the early metal bands, but it wasn't until 1988 that the metal world truly embraced the idea of the SF concept album. Voivod's brutal Dimension Hatröss is one such record that came out that year, but the more stunning example is Operation: Mindcrime by Queensrÿche. Melodic, immaculate, and surprisingly coherent for a concept album, Mindcrime is a speculative thriller about a heroin-addicted political dissident whose brain is rewired for assassination. Despite the ups and downs metal has suffered since the rise of grunge in the early '90s, Operation: Mindcrime has remained a touchstone of the genre, even inspiring a serviceable sequel in 2006, Operation: Mindcrime II.
Donald Fagen, Kamakiriad (1993)
The '90s were a tough time for the SF concept album (no, we're not counting Billy Idol's 1993 flop, Cyberpunk). Ironically, it took an old guy to remind everyone about the future. Donald Fagen of Steely Dan released his sophomore solo album, Kamakiriad, in 1993, and while it sounds as breezy yet sophisticated as your typical Steely Dan classic, it turned out to be a high-concept, cyberpunk travelogue through a virtual world of Fagen's device, one that seems to tap into both J.G. Ballard and Neal Stephenson. (Another old guy, one David Bowie, would usher out the '90s with another SF concept album — 1999's Outside — that would set the stage for the format's wild resurgence in the following decade.)
Deltron 3030, Deltron 3030 (2000)
Hip-hop producer Dan the Automator already had one SF concept album — Dr. Octagon's scattershot Dr. Octagonecologist — under his belt when he undertook 2000's self-titled album with Deltron 3030. With rapper Del tha Funkee Homosapian on the mike, the disc is a rich, multilayered, post-apocalyptic storyline whose polyglot music actually sounds like a new configuration of the future — that is, exactly what the year 2000 direly needed. To paraphrase Del himself in the song "3030," the album is a "perfect blend of technology and magic". The track "Time Keeps on Slipping," which features guest vocals from Damon Albarn of Brit-pop traditionalists Blur, set the stage for Dan's and Albarn's massively successful "virtual band," Gorillaz — a group that released its own futureshock concept album, Plastic Beach, in 2010.
Coheed and Cambria, The Amory Wars (2000-on)
The most ambitious SF story arc to ever be attempted in the rock arena, Coheed and Cambria's The Amory Wars, is not an album but an entire epic that spans almost every song the band has released since its early days as an unknown group called Delirium Trigger. A few random, early songs introduced the characters of Coheed and Cambria Kilgannon and their messianic son, Claudio — who just so happens to share a first name with Claudio Sanchez, the frontman of Coheed and Cambria. Unlike fellow post-hardcore practitioners My Chemical Romance, who have tried the concept-album thing with less success, Sanchez and crew are now five albums deep into the Amory Wars storyline. Besides spawning a comic book, the latest release in the arc, Year of the Black Rainbow, spun off into a novel that Sanchez co-wrote with Peter David. Sanchez's Star Wars-meets-Dune story has its faults, but paired with the band's soaring, anthemic, neo-progressive rock, it's as close to concept-album heaven as the SF world has come.
The Flaming Lips, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002)
Sometimes the first symptom of addiction to concept albums is denial. That definitely seems to be the case with The Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne, who followed his band's cinematic record The Soft Bulletin with something even more solidly narrative: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. Coyne has flatly denied that Yoshimi is a concept album, and certainly it wanders from the narrative quite a bit. However, there's no denying that, at its core, the record is a sculpted, symphonic, indie-rock parable full of the kind of pop-culture pastiche Cory Doctorow would be proud to call his own.
Nine Inch Nails, Year Zero (2007)
Many of SF's most horrifying predictions about the future have come true, in one form or another since 2001. Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor used the specters of perpetual war, terrorism, societal disintegration, and overall dystopia as fodder for Year Zero, a concept album that details militaristic oppression in the not-so-far-flung future of 2022. Compared to NIN classics like The Downward Spiral, Year Zero is jagged, guttural, and oozing paranoia — a high-tech yet visceral scenario that wouldn't be out of place in a Richard K. Morgan thriller.
The Lisps, Futurity (2009)
Steampunk-associated acts like Rasputina and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum are as fueled by gleeful anachronism as the genre itself. But the Arcade Fire-influenced, Brooklyn-based outfit The Lisps took things a few steps further with Futurity. Rather than an album per se, Futurity is a full-length stage musical the band produced in 2009 — the story of a Civil War soldier and science fiction writer beset by hallucinatory visions of the future. With the same melting-pot abandon used by novelists like Cherie Priest and Brian Francis Slattery, The Lisps have crafted an indie-rock opera that combines vintage Americana with mind-bending weirdness. Now they just need to record the damn thing.
Mastodon, Crack the Skye (2009)
Heavy metal made a huge comeback in the '00s, and so did the space opera. It only makes sense that the two would converge sooner or later. Mastodon, one of the heaviest yet most complex figureheads of today's metal scene, used their latest record, Crack the Skye, as an opportunity to explore the darkest reaches of the universe — and of reality itself. It's an overblown album, but gloriously so. Based around a paraplegic protagonist who travels the cosmos via astral projection, it's more Arthur C. Clarke than Alastair Reynolds. But the metaphysical aspect of the story doesn't dim the fact that Crack the Skye revels in the rich tradition of the SF concept album — including a "Space Oddity"-influenced video for the single "Oblivion" that brings everything full circle.
Fads and styles in music and SF come and go, but one thing is a constant: musicians will probably be trying to perfect the amalgamation of the rock album and the science-fiction novel for as long as there is such a thing as the future.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jason Heller is a Denver-based journalist and editor whose nonfiction has appeared in Weird Tales, Fantasy Magazine, Alternative Press, and The A.V. Club (where he's a regular contributor). He's also a co-author of Scribner's A.V. Club book, Inventory. His speculative fiction has been published in Sybil's Garage, Apex Magazine, Farrago's Wainscot, Brain Harvest, and the Descended from Darkness anthology, among others. When unchained from his laptop, he plays guitar in a punk band called The Fire Drills. They do the worst Cheap Trick cover you've ever heard.
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ISSN 1937-7843 Clarkesworld Magazine © 2013 Wyrm Publishing. Robot illustration by Serj Iulian.
warn bee wrote on June 1st, 2010 at 7:15 pm:
As usual you have supplied us with ANOTHER great article!!! If you get a chance make sure to check out the science fiction themed tape "molotov cocktail party" by frodus. I couldn't find $hit on the youtube but I did find this link:
http://www.myspace.com/fci/music/albums/molotov-cocktail-party-11895839
Sasquatch!!!!
Derek C. F. Pegritz wrote on June 1st, 2010 at 7:35 pm:
EXCELLENT article! You included two of my all-time favourite albums: 2112 and Replicas.
For interested readers, here's a few more albums with a very strong sci-fi narrative bent or inspiration:
S.P.O.C.K., their entire catalogue. Trekkie synthpop with a wonderfully pulpy, fun attitude.
Kraftwerk, Der Mensch-Maschine and Computerwelt. Seminal electronic music about...well, cyborgs and computers! It's Kraftwerk: EVERYthing they write is about cyborgs and computers!
Janelle Monae, Metropolis: The Chase Suit and The ArchAndroid. Superb contemporary indie-rock with a soul flare VERY prominently featuring androids in love in dystopian futures. Sort of like Gary Numan's Replicas if Replicas had been written by a teenage soul singer. Really quite brilliant.
Plan B, Cyber Chords and Sushi Stories. VERY hard-to-find punk/ska/alternative/whatever album strongly inspired by Gibsonian cyberpunk. One of the very few examples of non-electronic cyberpunk music out there!
Silicon Dream, Time Machine. Goofy, off-the-wall, melodramatic German electro-disco. Every song is a miniature sci-fi pulp serial compressed into radio-friendly pop-song length. Mindblowing.
Den Harrow, Overpower. Worth it mainly just for "Future Brain" and "Broken Radio"--the latter an amazing example of electronic dance music used as a weapon against invading aliens. Very cheesy, yes, but even today the synths on this album have a very futuristic vibe.
Herbie Hancock, Future Shock and Perfect Machine. What the P-Funk mob started with Mothership Connection, Hancock takes into the remote future using a few metric tonnes of synths. ROCKIT!
Really, though, there are *so many* examples of sci-fi-driven rock, New Wave, synthpop, and experimental electronic music Out There, the best one can do is start with the albums listed in the article itself and then start branching off from there.
Zander Nyrond wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 5:31 am:
And then there's Godley and Creme's "Consequences", and Klaatu's "Hope," though the story of the latter is a little more tenuous.
I'm guessing fantasy is outside the scope of the article...
Antonis M. wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 6:02 am:
A great and inspiring list but I was trully saddened not to see Ayreon's several SF masterpieces featured in there. Almost all of his albums are concept with epic SF themes. The mastermind behind Ayreon, Arjen Lucassen, is a person that grew up with SF and is very dedicated to it, drawing inspiration and creating amazing stories, lyrics and music.
Matthew Rotundo wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 11:42 am:
Jason, great article!
An addendum to Kilroy Was Here: The album was written in reaction to accusations from the PMRC and other whack-jobs that the band had hidden backward Satanic messages on the song "Snowblind," which appeared on Paradise Theater.
Tony wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 1:08 pm:
Blue Oyster Cult has many great sci-fi themed songs on their albums, mixed with an equal measure of horror. Songs such as Flaming Telepaths, Subhuman, Astronomy, E.T.I.(Extra Terrestrial Intelligence), Sole Survivor and Vengeance-The Pact (written for the film Heavy Metal) draw on some really dark science fiction themes. Great article.
Derek C. F. Pegritz wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 1:21 pm:
In re: Blue Oyster Cult--don't forget "Godzilla!"
Tony wrote on June 2nd, 2010 at 1:41 pm:
Don't know how I forgot Godzilla. Good one.
Nicholas Waller wrote on June 3rd, 2010 at 8:45 am:
Going back a bit, The Moody Blues' 1969 To Our Children's Children's Children has an SF theme combined with imagery related to the contemporary Apollo adventure.
King Crimson from the same sort of era had an sf/apocalyptic fantasy feel, as in "21st Century Schizoid Man", "In The Court Of The Cirmson King" ("The rusted chains of prison moons/ Are shattered by the sun/I walk a road, horizons change/The tournament's begun"), and the 1970s "Starless", the lyrics of which are ambiguous but the sound is like the advance of a robot tank army across a desolate landscape.
And more recently Muse's stuff has sf elements and themes.
Laurel Amberdine wrote on June 5th, 2010 at 6:38 pm:
Excellent article.
Not that I'd expect you to have heard of it, but my favorite SF-themed album is the fairly recent "Six Years of Gene Therapy" by Son of Rust (2005).
Alex J. Kane wrote on June 7th, 2010 at 3:48 pm:
Excellent, excellent article. Yes, 2112 indeed rocks, and Kilroy is a masterpiece. In fact, Styx and Rush have been inspiring me since I was a child. It was Styx that got me to start listening to music when I was 10 or 11, about the same time I started writing science fiction.
I think this draws a lot of valid comparisons between the two seemingly unrelated genres, and is just generally entertaining.
Other bands that have a lot of science fiction weaved into their work are Muse, Incubus, and The Killers.
"Spaceman" by the Killers -- give it a listen. Beautiful, brilliant stuff.
Evan wrote on June 7th, 2010 at 9:38 pm:
Not to nitpick, but Coheed was originally called "Shabutie," not Delirium Trigger. That has always just been the title of an amazing song.
Great article though. I'm not really sure if it counts as sci-fi, but The Mars Volta's earlier records are really good conceptual albums.
superkmac wrote on June 21st, 2010 at 12:50 pm:
Awesome article. It's always fun to see where sci-fi crosses over in other mediums or genres.
John Coulthart wrote on June 23rd, 2010 at 9:22 pm:
Mike Moorcock wrote the words for Sonic Attack on Space Ritual, and The Black Corridor is adapted from his novel, of course, but he doesn't perform on that album, the voice is Bob Calvert's. Moorcock reads on the later Warrior on the Edge of Time studio album and was also on some live recordings on Zones in 1983.
Calvert had some of his poetry in New Worlds Quarterly in the 1970s (his poetry collection was titled Centigrade 232), and many of his songs for the band steal from Ballard, Zelazny and others.
These kinds of lists sprawl very easily but I'd also mention French band Magma, whose prog/jazz concept albums concern an invented sf mythology with its own invented language, Kobaïan. Also French is Richard Pinhas whose 70s band Heldon took their name from Spinrad's Iron Dream (and Hawkwind had a track called Iron Dream...) and whose East-West album features Spinrad himself supplying vocals for a couple of tracks. Another Pinhas solo work, Chronolyse is based on Frank Herbert's Dune as is Visions of Dune by another Frenchman, Bernard Szajner. Klaus Schulze also recorded a Dune-inspired album. See what I mean about sprawl?
Lastly, Sun Ra devoted much of his career to his cosmic persona and the music it inspired. The first Sun Ra album appeared in the mid-50s so he's pretty much the godfather of all sf explorations which follow.
A true Child of the 60's wrote on June 23rd, 2010 at 10:11 pm:
Come on. What was the only rock album nominated for a Hugo award? That's right, the first Jefferson Starship album, 1970's Blows Against the Empire, which was also approved of by Robert Heinlein who said something to the effect that everyone stole ideas from him, but Paul Kantner was the only one who asked permission.
In addition to Paul Kantner and Grace Slick, it had the Grateful Dead's Jerry Garcia in what was probably his best hard rock solo ever in a duo with Grace channeling Nicky Hopkins on piano. Also had David Crosby and Graham Nash doing vocals, Nash also produced the album, and the Dead's Micky Hart doing drums and gongs.
If you do acid or other psychedelics, I completely recomend this album, it was made by acid heads FOR acid heads at the very end of the 60's. If you don't trip it's still a fantastic and multi layered musical experience.
marina wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 5:39 am:
What about the War of the World Album, with Justin Hayward, Julie Covington and Richard Burton narrating.It came out in the late seventies,if memory serves me correctly. It was a musical remake of Orsen Welles radio version 40 years prior.One of my favorite albums, came with an illustrated booklet that was pretty bizzare.
Neil Clarke wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 6:59 am:
Loving the comments here. Jason could only cover so much territory within the limits of this article, so it is great to see people contributing their own favorites.
That War of the Worlds album was "Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of the War of the Worlds" originally released in 1978. For those who might not know, Justin Hayward is from the Moody Blues. There was a live performance on DVD a few years back. Some clips are on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8JLqsbK5V0
Dominic wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 7:41 am:
Interesting article on a topic that's long overdue.
If I could suggest one more, how about a sf concept album created by an actual sf writer? Author Mack Maloney (Starhawks) recently released the first album with his group Sky Club. The album has a sf story behind it that's told through the CD booklet and ties in with all the tracks on the disc. It's available through his website http://www.mackmaloney.com.
Full disclosure: I'm one of the illustrators for the CD, but I don't get a cut of sales...I just think it's a cool album.
F
John Coulthart wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 8:52 am:
Mention of the Jeff Wayne album reminds me of a concept album which followed its success in 1979 (a bad year to try and release concept albums), an unwieldy double album entitled The Pentateuch Of The Cosmogony. This was mostly quasi-classical synth music by Dave Greenslade relating the evolution and destruction of an alien race through pollution and warfare. The vinyl came in a 12-inch sized hardback book filled with paintings by fantasy artist Patrick Woodroffe. The whole thing was a co-production between EMI and Roger Dean's publishing company Dragon's Dream and is probably something of a collector's item now.
Mark Watson wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 9:26 am:
* "In the Year 2525" by Zager & Evans (was number 1 in US)
* "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" by, of all people, the Carpenters
* "Magneto & the Titanium Man", by Wings
* "Diamond Dogs" - Bowie - was based on 1984. Bowie pretty much wrote hybrid SF/Pop for most of the 70s and 80s - Drive in Saturday, Ashes to Ashes, Panic in Detroit. Even "Let's Dance" has an SF video.
* the Year 3000 by Busted (covered, badly, by the Jonas Brothers)
* Angel Interceptor, by Ash
* ELO - New World Record kind of feels like it would like to be a concept album, but in particular Mission of the Sacred Heart (and before that, much of Eldorado, which was a concept album).
Also, more tenuously, Charles Manson was a fan of both the Beatles' Helter Skelter and Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, which kind of brings the two together. For me personally, I remember reading Frank Herbert's "Dune Messiah" while listening to John Lennon's Walls and Bridges over and over again, to the extent I can't listen Number 9 Dream without remembering scenes from the novel as well.
Ruben Sanchez wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 9:44 am:
What? No 'Brain Salad Surgery' by Emerson, Lake & Palmer? Man vs. computer in 1973.
David C. Fox wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 9:49 am:
hello?
Paul Kantner/Jefferson Starship?
Blows Against the Empire?
1970?!
my guess is you whippersnappers are just too young.
good article. thanks.
Joe wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 9:51 am:
You really shouldn't have just dismissed Billy Idol's "Cyberpunk". This album was ahead of it's time. The Patti Smith insprired version of the Velvet Underground's "Heroin" is stunning. It is a fantastic record, and I am NOT a Billy Idol fan. Give it a second listen.
You should also check out Warren Zevon's "Transverse City". Like everything else Zevon did, it was years ahead of the curve, but went un-noticed.
Florocarbons in the ozonelayer,
First the water then the wildlife goes.
Pretty soon there's not a creaturing stirring,
except the robots by the dynamos.
harold wrote on June 24th, 2010 at 3:17 pm:
I'm glad that at least 2 posters commented on Jefferson Starship's "Blows AgainstThe Empire". I consider it one of the top albums of all time.
Neil Clarke wrote on June 25th, 2010 at 6:48 am:
@20, since you bring up ELO, we really should add TIME to that list.
We can also add The Pixies, Stan Ridgway (including some of his Wall of Voodoo work), and Gary Numan to the list of SF influenced artists.
And then, of course, we have the current wave of steampunk bands.
Heidi wrote on July 9th, 2010 at 1:08 pm:
Not sure I'm following your point in saying ELO released *80s* sci-fi music before Styx did. Come Sail Away is from 1977, alien abduction included.
Henry Baum wrote on July 9th, 2010 at 1:18 pm:
Cool article. If anyone's interested, I'm writing a song for every chapter in my science fiction novel. The songs themselves aren't too science fiction sounding (ala Rush or Flaming Lips) but the lyrics follow the thread of the novel.
Here: http://www.theamericanbookofthedead.com/music/
zach wrote on July 9th, 2010 at 2:13 pm:
Never forget the mighty BloodHag
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bloodhag&aq=f
Far away wrote on July 9th, 2010 at 7:01 pm:
I can't resist mentioning a finnish band called CMX and their album Talvikuningas, which combines progressive rock with a relatively epic, non-chronologically told science fiction story. I've been able to find translated lyrics only in some youtube videos, though.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uasxetzuCoU&feature=related
Mike wrote on July 10th, 2010 at 1:11 am:
Bloodhag - Hell Bent for Letters
Every song is named after a scifi author! Fairly insane, fistpumping metal from Seattle.
http://www.myspace.com/bloodhag
Slough Feg - Ape Uprising
Singer is a philosophy professor. Lots of hot rockin' scifi action from San Francisco. Sample lyrics from the song "Simian Manifesto" goes something like "Never comin' down from the trees/Never bendin' down on my knees/You'll attempt to shackle my brain/Still afraid I'll put you to shame!"
http://www.myspace.com/sloughfeg
wayne stclair wrote on July 10th, 2010 at 6:23 am:
You forget one of the best. So good it actually won a Nebula... The Jefferson Starship's first album..."Blows Against the Empire" about some hippies who decide to hijack a starship. W
wayne stclair wrote on July 10th, 2010 at 6:25 am:
My mistake...Hugo award. W
Dan H wrote on July 10th, 2010 at 4:45 pm:
Cat Stevens' song "Freezing Steel", from the Catch Bull at 4 album (1972), is about an alien abduction.
rabelais wrote on July 10th, 2010 at 8:15 pm:
There was a synth/reggae/dub/space-rock band named The Vulcans, they were influenced by Star Trek.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgEJpjsoXdM
Thwacko wrote on August 17th, 2010 at 1:29 pm:
I want to thank all the commenters here for introducing me to at least one new band to slavishly devote myself to.
In the spirit of reciprocity, please allow me to mention the mighty Darkest of the Hillside Thickets from Vancouver, BC. http://www.thickets.net
Their entire catalog is Lovecraftian/sci-fi-inspired, and their last two albums, "Spaceship Zero" and "Shadow Out of Tim" are both solid concept albums, with "Shadow" being a retelling of Lovecraft's "Shadow Out of Time." Easily their strongest work ever.
Anyway, thanks again for some awesome listening advice.
John wrote on September 17th, 2010 at 4:51 am:
Ah, reminds me of lying on the floor of my darkened teenage bedroom listening to Pink Floyd on the headphones. Another band, not mentioned here, that were completely SF was the German group Amon Duul II. Albums like Carnival and Babylon, tracks like CID in Uruk - SF worlds in aural format. Worth checking out, though I am sure it would sound very dated now.