Posts Tagged song
Forms and Formulae: The Numbers Are Not Enough
Posted by Angela Brett in Forms and Formulae on July 12, 2014
This is the third in a series called ‘Forms and Formulae‘ in which I write about articles in the Princeton Companion to Mathematics using poetic forms covered by articles in the Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics. This post’s mathematics article is entitled ‘Some Fundamental Mathematical Definitions’ and the poetic form is air, which is a kind of song.
This song covers the first few sections of the article, about the development of the various number sets (Natural numbers [which I learnt as not including zero], whole numbers [including zero], integers, rational numbers, real numbers, and complex numbers) and finally a little abstract algebra. I’ve made a recording of it [direct mp3 link] using my robot choir and some instruments in GarageBand. I didn’t follow all the suggestions relating to airs, but one hallmark of an air is ‘illustrative musical devices highlighting specific words’, and I went overboard on that, illustrating each set using the background music. Airs are typically accompanied by a lute or other plucked instrument, but I used a piano instead, to highlight the word ‘Peano‘ in the first line.
[1 2 3]
You can play the Peano axioms.
Your successor will never fail.
But if you ain’t got nothing you ain’t got enough
so you start lower down the scale.
[0 1 2]
Well you’ve now got zero problems.
You can count on every fact.
You can add without an end, but exceed your subtrahend
or you’ll find you can’t subtract.
[-1 0 1]
So you add in the minus integers.
Zero gains another side.
You can add and take away, but not conquer all the way
’cause you can’t always divide.
[⅕,⅓, ¼]
Now your system is highly rational,
no division you can’t deal.
But no matter what you do, you can’t find the root of two
though you know that it must be real.
[ɸ, e, π]
So you fill all the gaps with irrationals.
You have a solid number line.
Solve absurdities at will but you’re out of square roots still
when you start with a minus sign.
[1+⅕i]
So you use your imagination.
You take the square of your mind’s i.
Your calculations never stall, but you wonder if that’s all
that this complex plane can fly.
[triangles, snares, cats]
The operations work on all numbers,
but is that all they can do?
They apply to other things; now you’ve groups and fields and rings
to apply that structure to.
∎
This took longer than my last Forms and Formulae, due to the recording. I made several improvements to my robot choir (an app I wrote one weekend to get my Mac to sing for me) including fixing a silly bug which had thrown the timing of my previous recordings off. I’ve also been taking music lessons over Skype with John Anealio, and I used a few of the things I learnt for this; if you know a bit of music theory you might notice a few music theory puns in there.
It’s not especially funny overall, but I mentioned when I called into Dementia Radio last night that I would submit it to the FuMP Sideshow, so I will. [Edit: and here it is!] Another thing that came up were these Tom Lehrer songs about mathematics, which the host was not aware of. They were some of the first Tom Lehrer songs I heard, and definitely worth a listen if you like Tom Lehrer, maths, or both. I found them in 2005 while looking to replace some pirated Tom Lehrer songs I’d accidentally deleted before listening to them (I did eventually buy all of Tom Lehrer’s albums) and in that same search I came across the MASSIVE database of maths and science songs, which led me to Jonathan Coulton and so many other musicians and friends.
One of those other musicians was Monty Harper, and the first tune I came up with was very similar to the verses of his Silly Song. I changed some parts to make it less similar, but mostly I just made it more repetitive and annoying. Dammit, Jim, I’m a poet, not a musician.
The article in the Princeton Companion to Mathematics was actually very long, and I haven’t finished reading it yet. Assuming I do get to the next article instead of writing something about the latter parts of this one, the next Forms and Formulae will be an alba (a dawn song about adulterous love!) about the goals of mathematical research. That should be fun. It will probably take a while, since it’s another song. Also, I will be busy next week at the 13th International Conference on the Short Story in English. I will be reading a story on the Thursday afternoon; probably a slightly revised version of Valet de cœur.
A Song For Angelastic to Sing With Worm Quartet
Posted by Angela Brett in NaPoWriMo, Things To Listen To on May 23, 2014
When you’ve let what is left of your pride go,
let your own song beset the FuMP sideshow! — Brush Up On Parody
Remember that parody I wrote of ‘A Song for Worm Quartet to Sing With TV’s Kyle’? Well, I recorded myself singing it. Sorry! It’s coming up to my birthday, so it’s time for me to embarrass myself publicly again.
You can thank ShoEboX of Worm Quartet for providing probably the only part of this that sounds good (the backing track) and also blame him for encouraging me. When I first emailed to ask about it, he played his part perfectly by not responding, and I recorded said lack of response for use in the song. When I actually met him at MarsCon 2014 and reminded him about it, he kindly and foolishly sent me the backing track. Some blame also falls on DJ Particle for singing (also at MarsCon) a song encouraging people to submit to the FuMP sideshow. This should appear on the sideshow around May 31, and I’m pretty sure it’ll be my best sideshow ever; it has twice the worms of my only other attempt, and one fewer html-parser-destroying character in the title.
I also met TV’s Kyle at MarsCon, and I understand why ShoEboX found his sideburns so compelling. In a world of musicians controlled by sentient beards of dubious alignment, TV’s Kyle is leading the resistance; he will not allow his binate bristly battalions to collude, not by the hair on his chinny chin chin. I forgot to ask him if he consented to [not] appearing in this track, though. Sorry, Kyle!
The lyrics I wrote originally had noticeably fewer nipples than the average Worm Quartet song, so I replaced ‘nebulae’ with ‘nipple gas’. It has similar consonants and constituents, so I don’t think this change affects either the form or function significantly. I also attempted to actually make my voice audible rather than covering it up as much as possible with the backing track, since after all, if people are going to endure my singing, they may as well at least hear what the words are. It’s difficult to record all of those words clearly, and to the right tune, and then overdose on testosterone and expect it to still be comprehensible. Here are the current lyrics: Read the rest of this entry »
Better (Entitled Hipster Version)
Posted by Angela Brett in NaPoWriMo on May 2, 2014
This is a parody of Jonathan Coulton’s song ‘Better‘. You probably haven’t heard of that song, because it’s from before Jonathan quit his day job and got all famous. It’s way better than his new stuff, because it’s about someone who liked their partner before said partner turned into a cyborg and sold out to the robot overlords. Opinions expressed in these lyrics do not reflect those of the author.
What have you done?
I think you know what I’m talking about.
No more homespun;
I’d just bought in and then you just sold out.
I remember the Yale Whiffenpoofs,
Spizzwinks(?) and Pop!Tech and Little Gray Books.
Little short lines I read nothing between.
Nobody loved you like me.
But it’s not me, it’s you.
It’s the star you’ve turned to.
The day job you quit
like no artist would do.
You were my great nerd love
that no-one had heard of,
but I don’t think that I like you better.
No I don’t think that I like you better.
You started out small,
some free tunes and some gigs as an opening band.
Now you must have it all;
you moved on to the sea once you’d soft rocked the land.
Now you tour with a real live Scarface,
big boomy drums and a super star bass,
and the act that you opened for opens your act;
you act like you don’t know your place.
Then you made record-deal ‘art’
and produced it with Flans,
denied us your real heart,
ignored your real fans.
You might be a giant,
but I ain’t no client
and I don’t think that I like you better.
No I don’t think that I like you better.
So that’s how it goes.
Your whole cake is a lie, and you’re eating it too.
Everyone knows.
Why would anyone think I’d be happy for you?
It’s not about you, it’s all about me.
Here is a list of what I want to see.
Don’t please the masses, and don’t plead for cash.
Just be authentic for free.
Now, I’m not against gold mines
’cause I like sluice box muck.
But man, you’re the nugget,
the million bucks.
You used to like monkeys,
but now you’re like Snuggies
and I don’t think that I like you better.
No I don’t think that I like you better.
Just for fun, I’ve included the titles of or otherwise strongly referenced the titles of at least five other songs of his, and one song by his opening band (that he used to open for) Paul and Storm. See if you can find them!
‘Better’ was actually one of the first Jonathan Coulton songs I heard, when I found Our Bodies, Ourselves, Our Cybernetic Arms, and Jonathan was probably about halfway through Thing A Week when I found it. I didn’t find out about the Whiffenpoofs, Spizzwinks(?) or Little Gray Books lectures until some time later. I like his new albums too and I’m glad that he’s successful and therefore has the freedom to do whatever he likes without worrying too much about what will sell. I’m happy that if I mention his name at a geek-adjacent event these days, people are likely to know who I’m talking about. I even sang ‘Better’ at a karaoke event in Vienna recently, and it wasn’t the first JoCo song to be sung there.
Brush Up on Parody
Posted by Angela Brett in NaPoWriMo on April 8, 2014
This is a parody of Brush Up on Parity by Arthur Roberts, which is in turn a parody of Brush Up Your Shakespeare, by Cole Porter, which I hadn’t heard until yesterday.
A lively part of society
thrives on musical comedy;
they’ll settle for nothing duller than
Python or Gilbert and Sullivan.
But the normals and the posers
don’t know how to hum along;
they’ll be looking down their noses
till they hear a popular song.
Brush up on parody;
fair use is allowed.
Brush up on parody;
bring the funnies to the crowd.
If a brain-damaged bully torments ya,
ease your pain with a dose of Dementia,
and if they overhear while they hit you
they’ll be laughing not at you but wit’ you.
When you’ve let what is left of your pride go,
let your own song beset the FuMP sideshow!
Brush up on parody
and they’ll laugh out loud (in a meeting!)
And they’ll laugh out loud.
Brush up on parody;
fair use is allowed
(but maybe you shouldn’t rely on a compulsory mechanical license if you want to protect your original arrangement from Glee’s plagiarists…)
bring the funnies to the crowd.
If you can’t tell a breve from a quarter,
you can borrow a tune from Cole Porter.
And if nuts try to shame you to stop it,
say they’ll just have to blame Arthur Roberts.
Lambast trends or concoct innuendo
and then send it to Dr. Demento!
Brush up on parody
and they’ll laugh out loud (tune’s miaowed!)
And they’ll laugh out loud (like a lolcat!)
And they’ll laugh out loud.
I wrote a full draft of this yesterday, but I’m glad I kept it around to touch up today. It still has a lot of dubious compromises between rhyme and reason, where I should have taken the time to find consensus. But it’s NaPoWriMo and I’m publishing a poem a day, so polish is scarce. I just noticed that the prompt for today is ‘let’s rewrite a famous poem, giving it our own spin’, so a song parody seems appropriate.
This is something I’ve wanted to write pretty much ever since I first heard Brush Up on Parity, because it’s such an obvious parody title, although I wasn’t sure what the lyrics would say. If I’d been basing this on Brush Up Your Shakespeare instead of Brush Up on Parity, I’d have made this longer and filled the extra stanzas with amusingly-contrived rhymes for the names of parody musicians. It’s not like rhyming Shakespeare plays, though; these are real people and I’d be conscious of which ones I was leaving out.
In case you’re wondering, the FuMP sideshow is a secondary podcast of the Funny Music Project, one which anyone can add a funny song to. Dr. Demento has been hosting a comedy music radio (now internet) show for decades, and if you haven’t heard of him you really need to brush up on parody. I have not actually listened, since his radio show wasn’t available when I grew up, and I haven’t figured out his website yet, but I met him at MarsCon!
The Old Dopamine Peddler
Posted by Angela Brett in NaPoWriMo on April 3, 2014
This is inspired by what Hank Green said about picking the right addiction just after singing about Tetris on JoCo Cruise Crazy 4. Appropriately, it can be sung to the Tetris tune (a.k.a. Korobeiniki, meaning Peddlers) though it is modeled more closely on Kobi LaCroix’s ‘The Peddler: A Half-Assed Translation’ than on any other version.
Open your mind and I know you will find that its system’s designed for times of rest.
You must know there are places you go when the throes of adulthood get you stressed.
Tics of our mental relief, incrementally pouring cement in between life’s bricks.
Kicks you spurn, they protect you from burnout, without them we’d turn out lunatics.
Drugs, TV or Tetris fun.
Learn, create, or get this done.
When willpower fails you, addiction assails you, and sometimes it ails you but there’s a way
to decide which addiction will guide you; when will won’t provide, you have a say.
Low-power moments with something to show for them, that’s how a grown-up can function well.
Something easy that won’t just delete, so it slowly accretes your world’s oyster shell.
Flappy Bird will do you wrong.
Add more words to parody song.
Not films of Fluffy, watch How To Make Stuff, and make making the puff you’re addicted to.
When at rest, read of skills that impressed, and you will find the best are afflicted too.
New bricks are falling; you can’t fit it all in; you may drop the ball into yawning gaps.
Do it too much, you won’t get to do much, but don’t over-rue such a paltry lapse.
Climb this twelve-step staircase to
time that will no longer waste you.
Post a creation of procrastination, you’ll find validation to keep you keen.
Reinforce, don’t forget to be awesome, endorse with the force of dopamine.
(Reinforce, don’t forget to be awesome, of course that’s endorsed by the brothers Green.)
Back to the Future Song
Posted by Angela Brett in NaPoWriMo on April 2, 2014
This is to be sung to the tune of Gulf War Song by Moxy Früvous, or some approximation of it. While writing it I forgot how much the tune varied, and got stresses and extra syllables in all sorts of wrong places while thinking of similar tunes in other parts of the song. It’s NaPoWriMo’s fault I’m blogging it in this condition. Luckily, I have a time machine, so I can go back and fix it later without worrying about messing anything up.
He made a car
that goes through time
with the fuel that he stole
when it hits eighty-eight miles an hour.
He nearly died.
The kid messed up.
Then they botched three more Times
and to fix things they needed more power.
What kind of klutz tears the space-time continuum,
And assumes that the remedy’s to keep on changing time?
He’s just a h0ver boi.
Doc’s just a drag racer.
If they killed their own forebears, would it still be a crime?
Fighters to change the past.
Fighters to get back.
Fighters for hoverboards, peace and a jet pack.
Don’t you insult this guy ’cause he’s Marty McFly,
and history seems to agree
to be what he says to be.
They went back, then back forward,
and the bullies all got their dues,
and it worked out just fine for ‘the good guys’.
Who was hurt? Who’s erased?
Were the the questions unasked.
Did a hurricane start with his Levi’s?
What could they do? He’s just Doc Brown, and not The Doctor.
They couldn’t track each wingbeat of every butterfly.
Don’t think it helps to say, ‘think, McFly, think’ again.
They’ve ways to make history; how could they not try?
Fighters to fix the past.
Fighters to get back.
Fighters for hoverboards, peace and a jet pack.
Don’t you insult this guy ’cause he’s Marty McFly,
and history seems to agree
to be what he says to be.
To heck with causality.
He’s just an underdog.
Doc’s just a scientist.
Time travel’s ‘heavy’, not light at c.
What could they do? He’s just Doc Brown, and not The Doctor.
And history seems to agree
to be what he says to be.
To heck with causality.
Great Scott, where and when are my keys?
Hotel Bacon (Michelle Branch parody)
Posted by Angela Brett in Adventures in Affluent Homelessness on October 13, 2013
This is to be sung to the tune of Hotel Paper by Michelle Branch.
I like mostly just hotel bacon.
Knowing the leftovers would never be consumed.
Raised, erased, their flesh is too tasty to leave here.
so I try not to eat meat but I do.
But I do.
No need to feed pigs the grain for my breakfast.
Sow means, reap none from the future; it’s theft.
I try to stop but it’s free to get this.
I know tomorrow there’ll be nothing left.
And I wanted to be
living in places I could keep living.
But I want luxury,
so I’ll take this hotel, and all it’s serving.
This turned out to cost more than I bargained for,
and I can’t stay in this place another day.
Forgive me; now that I’m baconless like you, I like you.
I just realised it way too late.
And I wanted to be
Living in places I could keep living.
But I got luxury,
So I took this hotel, and all its servings.
(Maybe this temporary retreat is surrender.)
My life’s mostly just hotel bacon.
King of Hearts: A Song For Me to Sing With Worm Quartet
Posted by Angela Brett in Shakespearean Insults, Writing Cards and Letters on August 26, 2013
This is a parody of ‘A Song For Worm Quartet To Sing With TV’s Kyle‘ by Worm Quartet (featuring TV’s Kyle.) The tune is pretty flexible, but I made this fit with the original tune verse-for-verse so it’s easier to figure out how to read it. Perhaps some day, if Shoebox (the guy from Worm Quartet) agrees, I will record myself singing it just barely audibly above the backing music, but for now your ears are safe.
This is a song, it’s a song I wrote
so I could sing it with Worm Quartet
’cause Worm Quartet does really swell songs
and I wanna do a song with him.
Shoebox:
Me:
Sure, I get it, you won’t sing this.
I’m just not as special as TV’s Kyle,
but I really thought we could do a duet;
should I have asked you first?
Shoebox:
Me:
Well I see I’m not going to make you sing
till I write nonsensically and I grow some sideburns.
I’m going to sit in my parents’ basement
and devour testosterone pills.
Shoebox:
Me:
Okay, Shoebox, why still no words?
Now my sideburns are a planet; you’re orbiting me.
And if you think you’re still better than me,
why don’t you go orbit your mom?
Shoebox:
Me:
There’s no use acting like you can’t breathe.
You don’t need to be conscious for nonsense words
like “chairs crochet nebulae into glum proofs
Of the wax insurance of nines.”
Shoebox:
Me:
Well I think I’m starting to understand:
you’d like to scream along silently.
How about for the next verse of the duet
you keep your pie hole shut.
Shoebox:
Me:
Well that was a *beep*ing terrible act;
you lack pizzazz and you’re out of key.
I’ll just sing all the rest myself,
so be quiet for this bit too.
So now we’ve come to the end of the song
The song I wrote that you refuse to sing
I bet TV’s Kyle, after singing your drivel
Will happily sing this song.
TV’s Kyle:
Me:
Well *beep* it then, I’ll ask John Cage.
Queen of Hearts: Zombie/Tasty (Cranberries parodies)
Posted by Angela Brett in Vasa Museet, Writing Cards and Letters on August 8, 2013
This is to be sung to the tune of Zombie by The Cranberries:
Another head exploded,
brethren slow-dead taken.
If you bravely try to save me
you must be mistaken.
‘Cause you see, it’s not me,
it’s just my dead body;
in your head, in your head
is my breakfast.
Glial cells, and neurons,
and neurons, but not eyes.
In your head, in your head, that’s my checklist.
In your head
In your head
Braaaains braaaains braa-aaa-aains…
What’s in your head?
In your head?
Braaaains braaaains braa-aaa-aa-aaa-aaa-nom
You too to voodoo. You too to voodoo. You too to voodoo. You too to voodoo.
Ex-human new one’s breaking
heart is taken over.
And the bravest try to save it;
they must be mistaken.
We have changed recipe
since voodoo in Haiti:
in your head, in your head
is now breakfast.
Glial cells, and neurons,
and neurons, but not eyes.
In your head, in your head, you’ll be feckless.
In your head
In your head
Braaaains braaaains braa-aaa-aains
What’s in your head?
In your head?
Braaaains braaaains braa-aaa-aa-aaa-aaa-om nom nom nom nom nom nom eeeaaarrrraraaaarrgh
And because I had the album ‘No Need To Argue’ on cassette tape, and therefore always listened to it in order, I couldn’t help getting the next song, ‘Empty‘ in my head once I finished ‘Zombie’. So here is the next track on The Zomberries’ ‘No Need To Argh, You!’ called ‘Tasty’.
[We start with somebody repeatedly moving their hands to their destroyed head and looking at them in dismay, trying to understand what has happened. After 51 seconds of poignant contemplation, they begin singing to their intact friend.]
Something has left my head and I don’t know where it went to… aah! Aah! Oww!
Somebody’s made me dead and it’s not when I was meant to.
Don’t you see me, don’t you hear me?
Don’t you see me standing here, ahh! Aaahh! Aarrghh!
Why did you get out that gun?
Don’t you know that I’m still in here?
Say a prayer for me;
move my soul on from this zombie.
My identity,
has it been taken?
Why are you shaking?
Help me… no brains now, they’ve turned into chow, let me show you how…
Help me… why the scream? You suddenly seem… you suddenly seem…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… feed me…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… eat ye…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… feed me…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… eat ye…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… feed me…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… eat ye…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… feed me…
Tasty… eehee… heehee… eat ye…
[These repetitions are sung during an encephalophagous ballet sequence, with the protagonist dancing around the victim, elegantly reaching in to grab handfuls of brain in time with the music, imparting angular momentum to the victim in doing so, such that the victim spins while slowly losing strength and crumpling to the floor. A beautiful, symmetrical pattern of blood spatter forms around the spinning victim. Later scholars will hypothesise that the spinning of the victim represents their literal ‘turning’ to zomebieism, but that idea is a load of brainslop.]
If my inner jukebox is accurate, the next track on the album is ‘Everything is dead‘, but we’ll leave that for another day.
Six things in progress, and this is the one I finish? It was about time I posted something, though. Back in the 90s, when people found out about music by listening to the radio, I was pretty obsessed with The Cranberries. When I got onto the internet, I joined fan mailing lists and found out about all their obscure songs. One of my first web pages, which I think is still up, for posterity, was a trading page listing my somewhat-rare singles. I still like the band, and followed what its members did after it split up. I’ve even seen Dolores O’Riordan live once and The Cranberries live a few times, since they were kind enough to get back together after I moved to Europe and started going to concerts. But as mp3s became more prevalent and easier to download and play, the zombie songs I was exposed to were rather different. So I thought The Cranberries’ biggest hit needed to be brought closer to current zombie song canon.
Edit: I forgot to mention, I’m in this awesome geek girl video by The Doubleclicks!
Seven of Hearts: mp<3 (Half-Assed Rapper Version)
Posted by Angela Brett in Shakespearean Insults, Writing Cards and Letters on May 20, 2013
Remember that poem I wrote about heart-drive based music players, which I said I imagined as a rap? Well, here’s a recording of me ‘rapping’ it (now with new cover art.)
I wore my MC Frontalot glasses while recording it in case they would imbue me with talent. It’s probably still terrible, but I don’t care if you laugh at me or with me, as long as you laugh.
According to The Burning Hell, apart from all the rabbit, chicken, worm or artificial hearts, inside every one of us there also beats the hearts of a mother, a father, a trapper, a cult leader, a comedian, and an amateur rapper. The hearts of a mother and father in me went into cardiac arrest when they saw what parenthood was like (to quote the same song again, where would I find the time to build my compound, my comedy career, my empire of rhyme?) but maybe the hearts of a trapper, cult leader, comedian and amateur rapper still beat in me. In fact, they’re probably quite easy to beat.
It’s pretty light on instrumental stuff, because every time I tried to add something I realised that I’m not very good at making things line up with beats properly, and I was probably making things worse. This is a clear sign that I am a half-assed rapper and should stick to normal poetry, but I’m not going to cudgel my brains about it. Edit, one day later: You know what? I bet you could do better than I could. Here, have a remix kit consisting of all of the parts not already linked from this post or easy to find on the internet, plus a different version of ‘Copy Protected!’. Most of the backing tracks I did use are there more for pun value than anything else: some heart beats, the omnichord track (cheesy panning added by me) and artificial heartbeat sampler track from Jonathan Coulton’s Artificial Heart, the start of Worm Quartet’s I Want To Be Taken Seriously As An Artist (when I start talking about worms) and of course, Devo Spice’s Earworm at the end. My robot choir sang the ‘copy protected!’ part in the Trinoids voice. I would apologise to the artists whose sounds I used in this monstrosity, but when you release music under a Creative Commons license, you have to be prepared to face the consequences. This is also my second song-like-thing in a row containing a Wilhelm scream. Perhaps I should include one in every song; my terrible music screams, so you don’t have to! If Possible Oscar can include Wilhelm screams in songs, so can I.
Am I being too self-deprecating? The ad at the beginning just happened to come out at 30 seconds, which I think is a standard length for an ad, so that was nice. Also, I quite like the ending; the intro of that song happens to loop quite nicely at the right length for my words. I hope you get it stuck in your head.
I set the artist name to Angelastic, because rappers never seem to go by their real names, and the song is quite gelastic. I’ll probably submit it to The FuMP sideshow, because I’ve always wanted to submit something to that, but it was difficult because I don’t normally sing when people can hear me, and most of what my robot choir has sung so far isn’t really suitable. Edit: I submitted it.
One thing I discovered while recording this was that I have great difficulty pronouncing the word ‘earthworm’ quickly without making some kind of weird flap or trill sound between the r and the th. That’ll teach me for pitying the unpronounced r’s enough as a kid to adopt a rhotic accent.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
Please tell me if you do something cool with it.
Creative Output 