For space is wide and good friends are too few.
I’ve got no real life-
I live on Tatooine…
We posted a video of this song a couple years back, but it’s time for us to bring it back in honor of Star Wars season. So, here’s “Midichlorian Rhapsody” by Jeff and Maya Bohnhoff, 2014 Pegasus award winner and absolute gem of a Star Wars parody. There’s also a video of the 2014 OVFF performance, if you want to see a bunch of filkers pull off an impressive arrangement (there’s a reason Queen rarely performed Bohemian Rhapsody live…)
“Sorry, Wrong Star” by the PDX Broadsides, an… alternate ending to a traditional Christmas story.
Have a merry Star Wars season, everyone!
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.
(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]
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.
I continue my quest to give @astriiformes‘ filk Rebellion Song the performance it deserves! Many thanks to @howtotrainyournana for singing it with me 🙂
Original song “Somebody Will” by Ada Palmer/Sassafras. Star Wars lyrics by astriiformes.
I was raised in a desert country
Where the sun burns double and it seldom rains,
So we drew our water from the meager trickle
In the narrow places that became our chains.Then a cry for rescue was heard in the wasteland,
In the plain disguise of a restless stray,
And this revelation at the edge of freedom:
You have to lose your bearings to find your way.
“Yehudi Mind Tricks” by Benjamin Newman, a gorgeous Jewish interpretation of Luke’s narrative in Star Wars.
Chords, lyrics, and mp3 are all available on Ben Newman’s website.
“Protocol (C-3PO’s Lament)” by the Doubleclicks, a troublingly relatable song about everyone’s favorite anxiety-laden protocol droid.
The moons are the moons and the sun is the sun
The fish bite at dusk and the fish bite at dawn
But a sun is a star and a moon is a world
And the deep shall bite down when the dusk unfurls.
The sea is the sea and the land is the land
A fish is a fish and a man is a man
But men are as fish to the land of the sea
And fishes, like men, cannot live hungry.
An arm is an arm and a leg is a leg
A seed is a seed and an egg is an egg
One for to butcher and one for to thresh
But the flesh of all is all one flesh.
A womb is a womb and a prick is a prick
The slow fish are slow and the fast fish are quick
But a womb may have thorns and a prick may bear wounds
Oh the swift break their fast, but the slow shall eat soon.
And the deep shall bite down when the dusk unfurls
From the hungriness at the heart of the world
So sleep, little fishes, swift may you dream
And slow may you wake to the arms of the sea.– local woman of Scaparus Port, Arkanis recorded by Sabekka Pallopides, student of Sentient Cultures at Theed University, Naboo
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animatedamerican:
What was the very first filk song you wrote about?oooh! I was writing songs since I was very small and they were all about fantasy things (exception: the time my fourth-grade class wrote and performed a musical about whales in which I played a marine biologist/detective) because everything in my life was about fantasy things.
But the first actual filk I wrote was a collab with one of my best friends from college. It was written to the tune of “I Ain’t Marching Anymore” and was called “I Ain’t A Martian Anymore.” I should see if I can dig up the words.
I think that she came up with the title, and then I suggested the line “Take a look at what we’ve done with a laser-powered gun,” and then we wrote verses back and forth to each other over the summer and on each other’s whiteboards when we got back to school. It was a very fun process!
(bonus minor collaborators were my dad for insisting I find a way to rhyme “vortex” with “cerebral cortex” and @thebastardofgloucester for knowing board games they play in the Star Wars universe)… i have a MIGHTY NEED to see these lyrics
Okay, here we are. Turns out I still have the whole thing memorized even though I need to go look up that Star Wars board game every time.
I Ain’t A Martian Anymore
You’ve heard of those Ferengi with their acquisition rules
Their plotting and their scheming and their lore
They take all that they need, they have no law but greed
But I ain’t a Martian anymore!
And you’ve doubtless met those green men in their funny little ships
Drawing circles in your fields of corn
Every day is an occasion for an alien invasion
But I ain’t a Martian anymore!
For it’s red planet’s children that always go to war
Red planet’s children who fall
Take a look at what we’ve done with a laser-powered gun
And tell me was it worth it all?
I’ve had my share of combat now in every part of life
In games of dejarik as well as war
If a wookie has to win it then why bother to begin it?
And I ain’t a Martian anymore!
And I must have wiped the Daleks out at least a hundred times
But they keep on resurrecting by the score
When they next return I’m slated to be first exterminated
But I ain’t a Martian anymore!
For it’s red planet’s children that always go to war
Red planet’s children who fall
Take a look at what we’ve done with a laser-powered gun
And tell me was it worth it all?
I may have been a Martian but I’m sick of all this strife
I’m sick of spilling alien guts and gore
I’ll wind up like a Reaver smashing heads in with a cleaver
If I stay a Martian anymore!
Now the Cybermen are screaming that the universe is theirs
The Vogons threaten poetry galore
Let them toss me in a vortx, mess with my cerebral cortex
But I ain’t a Martian anymore!
No I ain’t a Martian anymore!
For it’s red planet’s children that always go to war
Red planet’s children who fall
Take a look at what we’ve done with a laser-powered gun
And tell me was it worth it all?