Spock rocks to Oasis and Avatar’s Na’vi enjoy James Blunt

The Institute of Physics (IOP) and the PRS for Music, the organisation that collects royalties on behalf of composers and songwriters, today reveal the songs that our favourite sci-fi aliens could be listening to in outer space, based on the distance radio waves emitted from Earth have to travel to reach them.

The intergalactic hi-fi of Star Trek’s Spock, an inhabitant of the fictional planet Vulcan, 16 light years from Earth,  would currently be blasting out hits from 1994 with the likes of Oasis, Take That and D-Ream.

The Na’vi clan from James Cameron’s award winning film Avatar would have more contemporary music tastes with the music hitting the fictional planet Pandora, in the real Alpha Centauri System, coming from artists such as Eminem, James Blunt and other 2006 hit sensations.

Closer to home there is no such time delay with any visitors to the moon and even to the furthest planet in our solar system, Neptune – which is just under four and a half hours behind Earth- experiencing hardly any holdup.

Well outside of our own solar system but within the Milky Way, aliens from Vega - a much quoted real star whose fictional inhabitants include characters from Star Trek, Space 1999, and Babylon 5 -would be about to have a year of Madonna, Dire Straits, Simple Minds and The Smiths.

Dr. Andrew Newsam, Reader in Astronomy Education at The Astrophysics Research Institute, Liverpool John Moores University, said: “Whilst this has presented some humorous findings, and it’s interesting to discover the music preferences of our fictional friends, there is also a serious angle to consider here.

“Music is a great example of the practical impact of physics because not only is its function and form a product of physics but so is its communication, whether terrestrial or inter-terrestrial.”

Ellis Rich, chairman of PRS, added: “It’s interesting to note that if aliens exist then somewhere well beyond our solar system, regardless of their musical tastes they may well be listening to a very fresh faced jazz musician by the name of Ellis Rich.”

Destination   Time (hours; minutes)
Sun                   00:08
Moon              00:00
Mercury        00:11
Venus             00:14
Mars               00:07
Jupiter          00:50
Saturn            01:11
Uranus          02:55
Neptune       04:17
Pluto             04:26

Source: Dr Andrew Newsam., Liverpool John Moores University.