Posts Tagged Worm Quartet

We did a Christmas


I’m visiting Joey Marianer for Christmas, so we sang a slowed-down cover of a Worm Quartet song, as Joey is wont to do.

Worm Quartet is also known as Timothy F. Crist, so we wished everyone a merry Timothy F. Cristmas at the end. I hope you had one of those, whatever it means. I don’t see why anyone wouldn’t celebrate such a talented comedy musician.

I did actually try some of that eggnog (‘milk that have a alcohol and then we put a egg’ except that this one didn’t have a alcohol.) The few times I’ve had eggnog before, I’ve thought that the alcohol ruined what could have been a very nice drink, so I was excited to try some non-alcoholic eggnog. Not only that, but I tried it mixed with orange soda, as recommended on the Judge John Hodgman podcast. I really like it both ways! It’s also good with orange juice.

In unrelated news, we went to the MathsJam Annual Gathering, where Joey gave a talk on the true prisoner’s dilemma, and at MathsJam Jam we sang Symmetry and Seven Bridges (of Königsberg) Road. Ben Sparks taught everyone the harmonies for the Eagles version of Seven Bridges Road to sing Seven Bridges (of Königsberg) Road, and it was fantastic.

We didn’t sing This Tiling Never Repeats, because nobody (not even me) knew the music well enough. But on the Saturday of MathsJam, Joey and I wore Cirque du So What ‘I Want TILE!’ shirts, and I did in fact come away with a few handfuls of 3D-printed spectre aperiodic monotiles. Surprisingly, there were no aperiodic monotile shaped baked goods in the MathsJam BakeOff.

A whole lot of plastic tiles, all in the same complex, curvy shape, tiled together. They fit together in a way that doesn't allow the pattern to repeat.

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This Tiling Never Repeats (Split Enz parody)


I mentioned in a previous post that I was working on a parody of History Never Repeats, by Split Enz, about the aperiodic monotiles that have been found recently. I’ve finished it, so here are the lyrics:

This tiling never repeats
Unending plane the kite and dart complete
We wish to show we can improve
We may assume, there’s always more to prove
It was the best we used to know
From David Smith, a savage blow
Penrose is great, but now we sing
A monotile beats his tiling!
This tiling never repeats
But some might say, reflected tiles are cheats
We wish to show we can improve
We may assume, there’s always more to prove
You say we’ve all been played for fools
We can’t reflect, if that’s the rule
Better to work than make dispute
They made a change and now it’s moot
This tiling never repeats
There’s not a need the Spectre doesn’t meet
And there’s a way to make more and more
Leading us to a space we can explore
This tiling never repeats, this tiling never repeats
Infinite shapes, just turn the dials
Aperiodic monotiles
Pick one and all the plane is spanned  
We think at last we understand
This tiling never repeats
A manifold with manifold defeats
And there’s a way to make more and more
Leading us to a space we can explore
Never repeats!
Never repeats!
Never repeats!

This joins Symmetry and Seven Bridges (of Königsberg) Road in Joey’s and my submissions for this year’s MathsJamJam. Joey Marianer (yes, the one that I’ve somehow ended up married to!) also sang (and sent for inclusion in the Jam) Polygon Pam, a parody of The Beatles’ Polythene Pam written by Chella Quint:

I look forward to seeing Joey at MathsJam (and then Chella afterwards) and singing them together! I also look forward to eating some aperiodic monotile confections which will inevitably be baked for the MathsJam BakeOff.

I mentioned in a different post that Joey had been working on some cover songs which I was excited to share. The one I was most excited about is a slow cover of Entire Dog by Worm Quartet. It lasts almost twice as long as the rather frenetic original, and Joey initially sang it this way completely off-the-cuff one day over FaceTime. After a few slight revisions, I declared it was so good it should be stolen and used on Glee. But Joey kept singing it to me and making it even better.

If you think Joey made a mistake with some SI prefixes, read the video description. To really tie the post together, here’s a slow cover of a frenetic Worm Quartet song that also mentions math — and other kinds of multiplication… let’s just say it’s NSFW — Tired Of Not:

Both of these songs are on Worm Quartet’s new album, Carpe Tedium, which I highly recommend. Joey has been practising genre-benring covers of several more tracks from it, too.

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A Song For Angelastic to Sing With Worm Quartet


Me saying 'Hi, ShoEboX! Will you sing with me?' and ShoEboX replying, 'Sure! I have a blender right here. Pull down your pants!'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 »

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King of Hearts: A Song For Me to Sing With Worm Quartet


King of Hearts with the Shakespearean insult, 'You play the spaniel, and think with wagging your tongue to win me' against a backdrop of a Worm Quartet Songs of the Maniacs posterThis 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.

Read the rest of this entry »

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