“Sorry, Wrong Star” by the PDX Broadsides, an… alternate ending to a traditional Christmas story.
Have a merry Star Wars season, everyone!
science fiction
Red Shirt’s Prayer – The PDX Broadsides
As I boldly go, against our foes, my red shirt is my glory,
But If I should die, hold your head high and tell them all my story
“Red Shirt’s Prayer” by the PDX Broadsides, a song for the unsung heros of the Star Trek universe.
Next Gen Girl – Leslie Hudson
I’m a Next Gen girl
And I know my place
Is on the bridge of the Enterprise D
I need an android and a Betazoid
And a smattering of humanoids
Uh huh, to satisfy me
So when a Vulcan uses contractions
And there are multiple uniform infractions
I gotta remind myself that I’m a Next Gen girl
An alien in an Original world
“Next Gen Girl,” a declaration of loyalty from Leslie Hudson. She explains:
I grew up immersed in TNG and dabbling in the rest of Trek. When I finally started watching TOS as a series I felt it necessary to declare my bias. I may love it all, but TNG is mine forever.
Knights of the Round Station – fixomnia-scribble
Filk dump.
With thanks to the Monty Python crew…or apologies…
We’re knights of the round station,
We welcome every nation
We work for peace and liberty
Despite our reputation.
We live well here on Babylon,
Even with all the rabble on.We’re knights of the round station,
We’ve plenty a mutation
Which helps a bit when given scripts
That stretch imagination.
We’re all alert on Babylon:
We sleep with our communicators
Onnnnn…(tweedlesquirge)
(“Go ahead, C&C”)
In war we’re fair and prudent
If but a tad impudent
Between our quests we entertain guests
And scan them though we shouldn’t.
It’s a busy life on Babylon,
Lucky us, we’ve got Sheridan…
He’s Dead, Jim – Julia Ecklar
He’s dead, Jim.
He’s gone and died.
He’s croaked off,
I don’t know why.
Some weird disease we’ve found
Has put him six feet down.
Cremation
Has claimed him.
He’s dead, Jim.
“He’s Dead, Jim,” an early song by Julia Ecklar, which is… pretty much what it says on the tin.
Lyrics, chords, and sheet music are included in the Traveller Songbook, which is available for free download from Prometheus Music as a scanned PDF.
Kessel Run – Murder Ballads
Well, I hope you don’t mind me interrupting you miss
What’s a girl like you doing on a planet like this?
I really wouldn’t mind spending time with you
My name might be Solo, but I’m built for two
A little bit o’ booze, a little bit o’ nookie
And a little joy ride with a seven-foot Wookie
Gonna run
“Kessel Run,” a Han Solo song by Adam Fromm.
DMZ – Leslie Hudson
It’s more convenient to label us the dissidents
So you can sleep at night
We are the symptom things are more rotten
Than they are black and white
“DMZ” by Leslie Hudson, a song for the Maquis. Leslie writes in the song description: “The idea of mutiny so alien to TNG but central to DS9 & VOY demonstrates a fundamental shift in Trek philosophy. What glistens on the surface is suspect. Look deeper.”
Past the Edge of the Sky – Nat Elster
(or: The Literal Sky Boat Song)
Initially I wrote this intending it to be a sweet song about going home to space, but the original song is about the aftermath of a failed and bloody uprising, and it didn’t lend itself too well to happy. I wrote the current version thinking of the Alderaanian (and Jedhan and Hosnian…) refugees in Star Wars, but it could be applied to any number of science fiction universes, really.
To be sung to the tune of the Skye Boat Song.
[chorus:]
Speed bonny ship like a bird on the wing,
Upward the rockets fly;
Take us away to where the stars sing,
On past the edge of the sky.The atmosphere howls, the thrusters all roar,
The boosters light and flare.
‘Gainst gravity’s grasp, higher we soar,
We’ll soon escape the air.[chorus]
In space dark and wide, past systems we leap,
On countless worlds we’ll roam.
But here we remain, out in the deep;
They’ll never be our home.[chorus]
Burned is our world, exile and death;
Her children refugees.
Yet while our lungs still have their breath,
We’ll fight and never cease.[chorus]
Tatooine – Jeff & Maya Bohnhoff
Broken down star drive,
Feelin’ lucky to be alive.
Thought that I’d give old Lando a call.
But Vader was waiting,
With Carbonite plating –
So now I’m right here decorating the wall.
“Tatooine,” a parody for Han Solo by Jeff & Maya Bohnhoff, featuring lead vocals by Kris Bohnhoff.
“Encounter in Space” at Club Cosmos
“Encounter in Space” at Club Cosmos:
A video of Lars-Göran Johansson performing “Möte i rymden” (“Encounter in Space”) by Sam J. Lundwall at a 2012 club meeting of Club Cosmos, the oldest still extant science fiction club in Sweden (it was formed in 1954). “Möte i rymden” was one of three science fiction themed songs on Lundwall’s record “Visor i vår tid” (“Songs in Our Time”) which was released in 1966, which also contained several more songs that had fantasy themes or were fannish in outlook. It is possible that the song was written as early in 1963, when several of Lundwall’s songs were played at a Swedish con.
Note that the linked video is only available in WebM format. Here is a rough translation to English of the song:
Encounter in Space
We anchored in space by a faraway satellite
that lied in eternal orbit around its star.
In the mess hall I met a thirsty parasite;
||: a childhood friend that I now met again. :||
“Hi, dear Oskar Fikonström, mu old childhood friend!
You old sailor, are you still alive?
What has happened to you, you’re barely recognisable!”
||: “Yes, what has happened I will tell you right now. :||
I ran away from Earth real early as you know,
since I wanted to be on the ocean of space;
and with time I found a berth on an old space rocket,
||: the boss was a devil, but he was a fan! :|| [1]
We traveled to Vega with contraband and liquor,
I was still young and green and rather naïve.
I removed rust at the prow but got hardly any pay –
||: that time was the worst one in my life! :||
Work like a dog at any weather in the black holes of space,
and have the free watch in the terrible reactor light.
Space is filled with monsters that will kill humans,
||: and at all times a spaceman should be at hand! :||
Yes, I’ve seen most things that are here to see;
at Capella I met a beautiful blonde.
We were in her apartment when she exploded –
||: all of her was made up of nitroglycerine! :||
Black from soot and without clothes, all my body as a wound,
I sat astounded there with ashes in my lap
when a man with eight arms suddenly walked up to me:
||: the Earth’s consul with an unfathomable name! :||
I got new oxygen tubes and a decent ray gun
that was filled with death and the power of wild stars.
The consul’s fourth cousin got me a berth to a very far away sun,
||: but that trip wa the worst I ever had! :||
The ship where I got a place was of a strange type,
everything was wrong, and the air stank like a sewer.
Its captain was like an cephalopod with great green scales
||: and with evil-looking eyes at front and back! :||
Twenty light-years from Earth our engine broke down;
the animals in our cargo drank all our supplies.
We had to keep us alive using beer and aspirine;
||: one can hardly believe it’s true! :||
Yes, it was hard years in space, but I managed pretty well,
and though thirty I’m still at full vitality.
So thanks for all the drinks, but now I have to leave;
||: I have contraband in the rocket parked outside! :||
And then we parted in the mess hall with some simple words
and a handshake with my old childhood friend,
while thousands of millions white stars stood above
||: on the cold and black sky! :||
[1] The word “fan” can in Swedish both be used for fen and for the Devil.