Top Ten Space Alien Songs

I know, I promised you my Top Ten Astronaut songs this week... but with the release of Prometheus, this one seemed too good an opportunity to miss.

This Top Ten is also dedicated to the late Ray Bradbury, one of my favourite authors. Something Wicked This Way Comes is among the greatest novels ever written.



10. Arctic Monkeys - Space Invaders

A Monkeys rarity. Can't remember where it came from. It's an Unidentified Playing Object.

9. Magnetic Fields - Alien Being

You talk a lot about nothing at all
Watch TV shows about nothing at all
Think a lot about nothing at all
Listen to songs about nothing at all

You write the laws about nothing at all
Make 3D films about nothing at all
Stage happenings about nothing at all
Sound and light shows about nothing at all

You complain about nothing at all
Go insane about nothing at all

You have no feelings
I think you are an alien being

8. Neil Hannon - Aliens

Another rarity: it's not often you hear Neil Hannon releasing a song under his real name. This was part of an Oxfam charity album called The Cake Sale. It's really quite lovely.

7. Dweeb - Chart Raider Space Invader

Dweeb were a late 90s indie band who sounded quite a lot like Ash and had most success with their excellent single Scooby Doo. This was their debut record... good luck in tracking it down!

6. Soko - I Thought I Was An Alien

Kind of a French Bjork, Soko transfixed me a couple of years back with her superb stalker anthem I'll Kill Her. Apparently she hates it now she's grown up a bit. Because I haven't grown up, I still love it. I Thought I Was An Alien is the title track of her latest album.

5. Dan Bern - Talkin' Alien Abduction Blues

In which Dan Bern gets abducted by aliens who strap him down, stick a probe up his nose... and start critiquing his songwriting.

Then they waved this wand around my head
Said, "Now we're reading your thoughts, you see
You got an awful lot of songs in there
Though it seems they're all in the key of G"

I said "What about Marilyn? That's in D"
They said "D flat, actually"
I said, "Yeah, because I tune it down a half step
What about Hannibal?"
They said "What about Hannibal?"
I said "Well, technically, it's in G
But it's really a dropped D tuning capo'd up"

They said "How come you don't play the harmonica more?"
I said "How come I'm in a space ship
Talking to aliens about my act?"
They said, "We'd rather talk physics
But you're illiterate there"

Couldn't argue.

4. Fountains Of Wayne - I Want An Alien For Christmas

Top of the FOWs Xmas list: a little green guy about three feet high with 17 eyes who knows how to fly. Who wouldn't want one?

3. David Bowie - Starman / Loving The Alien

Can you believe it's 40 years since the release of Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders From Mars? I could easily have filled a Top Ten just from the Bowie back catalogue, but Starman is undoubtedly his greatest alien moment (and not just because it gave its name to the John Carpenter / Jeff Bridges movie). Loving The Alien can't compete, but it does feature one of crazy Davey's maddest videos.

2. Radiohead - Subterranean Homesick Alien

Like Bowie, Thom Yorke could easily have fallen to earth with a bump. Could this be his most autobiographical song?

I wish that they'd swoop down, in a country lane
Late at night when I'm driving
Take me on board their beautiful ship, show me the world as I'd love to see it
I'd tell all my friends but they'd never believe me
They'd think that I'd finally lost it completely
I'd show them the stars, and the meaning of life
They'd shut me away, but I'd be alright
Alright

1. The Carpenters - Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Crafts (The Recognized Anthem of World Contact Day)

Originally recorded by Klaatu, who score an extra point for naming themselves after the alien hero of The Day The Earth Stood Still... but it's Karen Carpenter's version I consider definitive.



Those were my favourite alien anthems... but which one will you take to your leader?

Movie Review: Prometheus

The lukewarm reviews did Prometheus a favour. They helped puncture the biggest bubble of hype to surround any movie in recent memory. It's been impossible to take a breath over the last few weeks without someone trying to ram Prometheus down your throat. Complete three minute TV ad breaks devoted to one monster trailer. "Special cinema featurettes" interviewing the entire crew, right down to the big stone head's cleaning lady. You couldn't go out in the street without being accosted by Ridley Scott, desperate to tell you about his "creation myth" and how "this was much more than just an Alien prequel".

Like many people, I'm wary of too much hype. When Hollywood throws so much money at a film before it opens (and refuses critics access till the very last second), I start to smell turkey. And then, late last week... I started to hear the reviews. Ho-hum three starrers that complained of a poor script, a lack of suspense, anticlimax and 'meh'. One former colleague, possibly the world's biggest Alien fan, whose excitement over this movie has been bubbling over for months, broke down in soppy wet tears on Facebook and blew his brains out with a bicycle pump.

As I said at the top, all this did Prometheus a huge favour. My expectations weren't too high... and so...

I liked it.

Go in expecting another Aliens movie and you'll probably be disappointed. Because that's not what's on offer here: and that's a good thing. Indeed, the closing moneyshot seems almost shoed in to make the obligatory connection to the franchise Scott gave messy birth to back in 1979. This is a film that stands fine on its own, and may even have benefited from not being tied to the movies that went before. It has a fascinating mythology all its own, a great cast (Fassbender steals it once again) and some truly stunning visuals (note: I did not watch this film in 3D, and can only imagine what a mess that pointless "technology" would have made of many of the key moments).

Don't get me wrong, Prometheus is by no means perfect. There are some pretty huge plotholes and the last half hour feels rushed. Guy Pearce, while excellent, seems a strange choice for a role that could just as easily been filled by an older actor minus the liver-spotted war paint. But these are quibbles; I didn't have any major problems with the script, the mystery kept me engrossed, and Noomi Rapace proves a great choice for the lead, more than just a girl with a dragon tattoo... and much more than just a Ripley substitute.

It's all left wide open for a sequel, obviously, yet if they do go down that route they'll need to make damned sure not to revert to type. There are many questions still to be answered here, but the temptation to run back down a dimly lit corridor towards another crowd pleasing humans versus aliens shoot-out must be avoided at all costs.