Posted on

My Gen X Playlist: Under the Milky Way – The Church

Scroll down to see more content
Daily writing prompt
Do you think humans will ever colonize Mars? What would life there actually look like?
View all responses

I’m all for colonizing Mars if it ever comes to that. I grew up on the original Star Trek series. Exploration to new worlds sounds fun and interesting. It’s something that was dropped in my head years ago as a kid.

If you asked me if I’d volunteer to go, my 20 year old self would probably consider it. It sounds like a cool adventure. On the other hand, my fifty year old self would take a hard pass. I’m quite comfortable how my life has become and I’m not looking for any big changes in my day to day routine. Heck, I get all turned around after a Monday holiday when the trash man doesn’t pick up our trash as scheduled. Plus, I don’t think Netflix’s range extends that far. And where would I get my morning coffee? I can go on and on. No thank you. The only Milky Way I want is made of chocolate and choc full of sugar. That’s as close as I want to come.

The Church released Under the Milky Way in 1988. It was written by frontman Steve Kilbey and the rest of the band hated it. Their manager insisted on recording it and it became their biggest hit.

The success of the single proved to be a blessing and a curse for the band. “It changed everything in our lives, it put me on a new level of temptation and opened more doors that maybe shouldn’t have been opened… and made a lot of money and so we did a lot of touring,” Kilbey told Elsewhere. “But saying that, the guys in the band all hated each other and they all hated me. Instead of being grateful that I’d written this song which had dragged them into the spotlight they were sort of envious and miserable about it as well.”

Songfacts

It’s one thing to hate your bandmates while on tour. You could always give them the finger and leave them behind. But if you are on a long flight to Mars and you ended up hating your shipmates, there’s nowhere to escape or hide. Hell, sometimes I go crazy sitting next to an annoying stranger on a three hour flight. But three hours is only three hours and after deboarding, we go our separate ways. AI tells me it takes 6 to 9 months to fly to Mars. That’s a long time to endure sitting next to a sweaty guy that eats corn chips with his mouth open and insists on taking off his shoes for the entire flight. No thank you.

–

For a complete playlist, please click here.

For the Spotify playlist, please click here.

Sometimes when this place gets kind of empty
Sound of their breath fades with the light
I think about the loveless fascination
Under the Milky Way tonight

Lower the curtain down in Memphis
Lower the curtain down all right
I got no time for private consultation
Under the Milky Way tonight

Wish I knew what you were looking for
Might have known what you would find

And it's something quite peculiar
Something that's shimmering and white
It leads you here despite your destination
Under the Milky Way tonight

Under the Milky Way tonight

18 thoughts on “My Gen X Playlist: Under the Milky Way – The Church”

  4. There is a short film on Curry Barkers You Tube Channe That’s a bad idea called “Fly me to the earth” which is exactly what I could see happening on any planet colonization.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    1. Just finished watching it. I can see it going down like that. Funny that a bunch of randos go and literally eat moon pies and drink moon beer all day. I did like the short REM reference to man on the moon, though.

      Thanks for the short film clip. I enjoyed it and it totally fit in.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  9. No thank you! I despair about the amount of money these tech guys are spending trying to colonise the universe when we can’t even get this planet right!
    Love your comments about travellers -it brought back a 6 hr flight I did from New York to San Fran. I didn’t realise we had to book our seats before the flight so we landed up with two seats together which I gave to my children and one on its own which was me. Sat on the aisle seat next to two “really out there” hippies”. They didn’t believe in deodorant, ate really smelly, mostly raw food constantly from a large cooler, farted and had unkempt hair that made me worry about lice! 🪳

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment