"Why Does The Sun Shine?" - They Might Be Giants, 1993 (alternative indie rock)

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees.

The sun is hot
The sun is not
A place where we could live
But here on Earth there'd be no life
Without the light it gives.

We need its light
We need its heat
The sunlight that we see
The sunlight comes from our own sun's
Atomic energy.

The sun is hot

The sun is so hot that everything on it is a gas:
Aluminum, copper, iron, and many others.

The sun is large

If the sun were hollow a million Earth's would fit inside
And yet it is only a middle-sized star.

The sun is far away

About 93 million miles away
That's why it looks so small

But even when its out of sight
The sun shines night and day.

Scientists have found that the sun is a huge atom-smashing machine.
The heat and light of the sun are caused by nuclear reactions
between hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, and helium.

The Sun, ladies and gentlemen. 'Nuff said. Well, maybe not quite 'nuff. The tune is catchy, the cd is pretty good, and the facts are straight. As a matter of fact, while I was looking around for something intelligent to say about the sun that TMBG didn't already, I found the lyrics of this song included in some astronomy lecture notes from some pretty prestigious educational institutions. However, I find that in some aspects these lyrics fall short in discription. Allow me:

• More specifically, 600 million tons of hydrogen are "built into" 596 tons of helium at a temperature of 5800 degrees Kelvin. That's 9,980.33 degrees Fahrenheit, and that's just on the surface where it's cold! The core temperature of the sun is modeled to be 15.5 million degrees Kelvin. That's 27,899,540.33 degrees Fahrenheit. Sunblock anyone?
• Are you always reminding people at home to turn out the light when they leave the room? The sun's luminosity is 390 trillion trillion watts (that's 3.9 with 26 zeros after it) and a "watt" is the amount of light it puts out in 1 second. Since the sun burns night and day, that means that at today's rates, at 6.3 cents per kilowatt hour, your electric bill for ONE DAY (24 hours) would be $5.9 nonillion (yes, it's a word). That's a 5.9 with 30 zeros after it. Better start puttin' in for some overtime.
• It takes 8 minutes for the light from the sun to reach the earth, but for you to outrun the shadow of the setting sun, you would have to travel at 1,038 mph. Fasten your seatbelt!
• "Large" is an understatement. It would only take you about 2 weeks to drive all the way around the Earth at 60 mph. The sun is 2,733,185.6 miles in circumference (870,000 miles in diameter). At 60 mph, it would take you 5 years to drive all the way around...and that's providing you don't stop to eat, sleep, use the restroom, or ask for directions.
• But remember it's only a middle-sized star. Stars the size of our sun are called "dwarf stars"...probably because the largest stars, called "giants" and "supergiants" that can be hudreds of times larger across than our sun. For example, Betelgeuse in the Orion constellation is 650 times larger in diameter than the sun.

I hope that clears up some of the ambiguity that the song leaves us with about certain things. Just please don't ask me to sing all of that.

"Why Does The Sun Shine?" - They Might Be Giants, 1993

~sun facts from stellar places such as Ohio State University's astronomy department and UC Berkeley's Center for Science Education and many other hot spots. The math is all mine, so if it's wrong, be a sport and give it a little help.

"Space Oddity" - David Bowie, 1969 (folk rock)

Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on

Ground Control to Major Tom
Commencing countdown, engines on
Check ignition and may God's love be with you

(spoken)
Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, One, Liftoff

This is Ground Control to Major Tom
You've really made the grade
And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear
Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare

"This is Major Tom to Ground Control
I'm stepping through the door
And I'm floating in a most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today

For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do

Though I'm past one hundred thousand miles
I'm feeling very still
And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
Tell my wife I love her very much she knows"

Ground Control to Major Tom
Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you hear me, Major Tom?
Can you....

"Here am I floating round my tin can
Far above the Moon
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do."

The song's main character, Major Tom, is a fictional astronaut and the story the song tells is that he gets lost in space. The song was inspired by Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey. Bowie planned the writing and release of Space Oddity to coincide with the BBC's media coverage of the launch of the US's Apollo 11 moon landing mission. See...not everything is about war and politics.

Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the moon, launched on July 16, 1969. It was this flight that made history forever and reached Pres. John F. Kennedy's goal when he said, "I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth." On July 20, Edwin Eugene "Buzz" Aldrin and Neil Alden Armstrong walked on the moon's surface while lunar command module captain, Michael Collins, orbited above.

It was this lunar landing where Neil Armstrong uttered the very famous words, "Houston, Tranquility Base, here. The Eagle has landed." However, unbeknownst to most people, when Armstrong spoke those words, he through Mission Control into somewhat of a tizzy...because nobody at Mission Control had no idea what he was talking about at first.

The call sign Armstrong was supposed to use was Eagle, which was the name of the lunar module (LEM) that actually landed on the moon's surface - the vehicle that carried the two astronauts. It was given the name Eagle because of the bald eagle insignia that it carried. There were actually a few other call signs that NASA toyed with during the planning. Thankfully, the call signs Snowcone and Haystack were quickly changed before being announced to the press.

Tranquility Base, the name Armstrong gave to the Eagle's landing site, was a spot in the southwestern corner of the lunar plain called The Sea of Tranquility, near the craters Sabine and Ritter. The Sea of Tranquility is the name of one a lunar mare (latin for 'sea'). They were called 'seas' by the early astronomers who mistoook them for actual water seas. However, they are not water seas but basaltic plains formed by ancient volcanic eruptions.

During space travel, call signs are given to people and vehicles...never landmarks. However, unlike most names bestowed upon lunar landmarks, in the light of the Apollo 11 mission's huge history-setting success, the designation Tranquility Base was soon officially recognized by NASA and the International Astronomical Union. Because of those famous Armstrong words, Tranquility Base now appears on lunar maps as Statio Tranquillitatis.

And while Neil Armstrong went down in history for his famous, albeit erroneous quote, somehow Houston's response got lost in the shuffle:

Capcom Charles Duke: "Roger, Twan... [correcting himself] Tranquility. We copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot."

Hey, give the guy a break. He was probably excited. And he had every reason to be because his space flight didn't turn out like Major Tom's. Nope...they saved that for the sequel - Apollo 13.

"Space Oddity" - David Bowie, 1969 (original video and recording)

(gathered from various sources in space...cyberspace, that is)