If I had to pick one album to be launched beyond the Solar system, it would be the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” album. Undoubtedly, for me, it is a cosmic album.
This post is a reference to not only my post from the past, entitled “Abbey Road.” I also want to refer to the Voyager Golden Record. These two phonograph records were included aboard both Voyager spacecrafts launched in 1977. According to the Thames and Hudson’s “The History of Space Exploration,” it is a time capsule of human civilization sent out into the vastness of space. Voyagers 1 and 2 were the third and fourth man-made objects that left the Solar System. It had the “Sounds of Earth” record, a musical disc. The disc contained sounds of Earth, including Johann Sebastian Bach’s, Ludwig van Beethoven’s, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s, and Chuck Berry’s songs.
When I read all these things, I started to wonder why Carl Sagan, the brainchild of the Voyager Golden Record disc, did not include any of the Beatles’ songs.
After all, the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” is a cosmic album. If I wanted to let aliens hear the voice of Earth, I would recommend them “Abbey Road.” Of course, I know that on the Voyager Golden Records, there are human greetings in fifty-five languages and various sounds of Earth, including animals. Still, I would attach the “Abbey Road” to this time capsule sent out of the Solar System. When a human civilization becomes extinct, magical human songs performed by the Fab Four can be listened to in deep outer space. They would last forever, I suppose. Who knows, perhaps when aliens listen to the Voyager Golden Record with the “Abbey Road” at the forefront, they would think they hear God’s voice? I do not know it. Still, I just love rocking in the clouds and listening to a cosmic album, “Abbey Road.”
