Brian May Premiering New Solo Track From NASA Headquarters
The intersection of guitar god Brian May and doctorate in astrophysics toting Brian May is this exact moment.
On January 1, 2019 at 12:02 AM EST, May will release his first new solo track titled “New Horizons.” Per QueenOnline.com, the track’s world premiere will emanate from NASA’s Maryland headquarters and serves as a tribute to NASA’s New Horizons mission which “will achieve the most distant spacecraft flyby in history, in an encounter with a remote Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) named Ultima Thule, far out beyond Pluto on the edges of the solar system.”
See! That intro sentence above was no joke, whatsoever!
In a statement about the song, May says, “This project has energised me in a new way. For me, it’s been an exciting challenge to bring two sides of my life together – Astronomy and Music. It was Alan Stern, the Project Instigator of this amazing NASA Mission, who threw down the glove last May. He asked if I could come up with a theme for Ultima Thule which could be played as the NH probe reached this new destination. I was inspired by the idea that this is the furthest that the Hand of Man has ever reached – it will be by far the most distant object we have ever seen at close quarters, through the images which the spacecraft will beam back to Earth. To me, it epitomises the human spirit’s unceasing desire to understand the Universe we inhabit. Everyone who has devoted so much energy to this mission since its launch in January 2006 will be feeling they are actually INSIDE that small but intrepid vehicle – only about the size of a grand piano – as it pulls off another spectacular close encounter. And through the vehicle’s ‘eyes’ we will begin to learn, for the very first time, what a Kuiper Belt Object is made of. And pick up precious clues about how our solar system was born.”
A tease of the track can be heard below.
Erica Banas is rock/classic rock news blogger that loves the smell of old vinyl in the morning.
