Space Weird Thing

I recently wrote about Thing Explainer, a book by my friend and xkcd author Randall Munroe that explains complex scientific ideas using only the most common 1,000 words in the English language (originally motivated by his flippin’ brilliant Up Goer Five comic).

As I wrote that article (also using just the 1,000 most common words), I wondered how far someone could take this idea.

Now I know. My dear friends Marian Call and Molly Lewis—geek musicians and very, very clever people—made a music video that is a shot-by-shot recreation of David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” using Up Goer Five speak.

Seriously. You have to stop what you’re doing and watch this, because wow. Here is “Space Weird Thing”:

I have a lot of smart friends, and I love them all. Go listen to more of Marian’s music, and Molly’s music, and buy all the things.