Music by Taylor Swift, Max Martin, and Shellback, Lyrics by Brian Gray
I have no memory of how I got the idea for this parody. Obviously "tribbles" sounds like "trouble", so I have to assume it just took off from there, acquiring the janitor aspect along the way.
I performed this song live a couple times, once on guitar, the second time on uke. Finally realized I actually like it and should produce a legitimate recording, so here we are. Almost regretted the decision to do a Weird Al-esque recreation of the original production, as it's a monster. Swooshes, deep pulsing synths, kick drum with a very specific amount of beater noise, and that reversed guitar in the bridge.
On the other hand, it gave me the excuse to play all kinds of guitar parts. Some clean and precise (the intro), some sliding from fret to fret (start of the chorus), some just kind of dirty strumming and improvising over chords (later in the chorus). And all those other instruments were fun to pick out. There's even a piccolo in the second verse!
I'm glad I decided to do this; it taught me a lot about how professional sound engineers get certain effects.
lyrics
[Verse 1]
A cast and crew of 6, essential to the plot, headed out to join a party that is not
About me, about me, about me-e-e-e-e
Instead I'm scraping gum, 11 decks below, making it ok for you to boldly go
Without me, without me, without me-e-e-e-e
It's all fun and games with 2 Gorn and 1 cup
No one thinks about the dude who cleans up
[Chorus]
47 tribbles in the starboard photonic spillport now
3 melted redshirts to be restored, if they find out how, oh
47 tribbles in the aft port Bussard collector now
9 strange new toilets to be explored, and a Ceti eel that splattered on the bow
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
[Verse 2]
In stardate 0+, it's easy to commit, when drinking on a couch, replicating shit
Gets boring, it's boring, it's boring-ing-ing-ing-ing
So here I am in space, 1,000,000,000,000 miles aloft. Instead of single-malt, all I polish off
Is flooring, is flooring, is flooring-ing-ing-ing-ing
And I lie in bunk with a cube to unwind. When the 3rd shift comes, I wake up to find, yeah
[Chorus]
47 tribbles in the starboard photonic spillport now
3 melted redshirts to be absorbed with my big red towel, oh
47 tribbles in the aft port Bussard collector now
9 strange new toilets to be explored, and a Ceti eel that's splattered on the bow
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
[Bridge]
And I dream at night, or is it day?
That I'll be the one to fight and save a world and make a mess, yeah
[Chorus]
47 tribbles in the starboard photonic spillport now
3 melted redshirts to be ignored 'til they dock this scow, oh
47 tribbles in the aft port Bussard collector now
9 strange new toilets to be explored, and a Ceti eel that's splattered on the bow
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
Oh! Oh! (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
47 tribbles to the starboard (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
47 tribbles to the aft port (tribbles, tribbles, tribbles)
credits
from Every Song in the Universe,
released January 30, 2013
Music by Taylor Swift, Max Martin, and Shellback, Lyrics by Brian Gray
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