to me,” One Ring Zero multi-instrumentalist Michael Hearst told Wired.com in an e-mail interview. “Even if it’s just a dwarf planet.”

Released this week, Planets is One Ring Zero’s latest attempt to smarten up traditional pop using unconventional sonics and subjects. For more than a decade, Hearst and One Ring Zero co-founder and multi-instrumentalist Joshua Camp have served up multidisciplinary music using theremins, accordions, claviolas, toy pianos, Jones-o-phones and other unusual instruments.

The group’s popular 2004 release, As Smart As We Are, set odd music to original lyrics from big-shot bookworms like Margaret Atwood, Jonathan Lethem and Neil Gaiman while rounding out the rough edges of the so-called Lit Rock genre.

One Ring Zero’s newest effort, hammered out by an expanded five-piece unit, is more cosmologically inclined.

“We started the project when the news broke that the International Astronomical Union had demoted Pluto,” Hearst said. “A song needed to be written. It then dawned on us that it had been just about 100 years since Gustav Holst had composed an orchestral suite. Seemed like maybe it was time to revisit our solar system with some new tunes.”

The astronomical musical leap has impressed at least one major space-gazing scientist. Astrophysicist and Hayden Planetarium director Neil deGrasse Tyson tuned in, turned on and then dropped a money quote: “Was enjoying One Ring Zero’s Planets album until a track titled ‘Pluto’ came on. What’s up with that?”

“That made us very happy,” said Hearst, whose favorite non-Earth planet just happens to be Saturn. “I haven’t actually met him in person. Initially, we were thinking of asking various planetary scientists, astrophysicists and even former astronauts to write lyrics for us, but most of them were, well, a bit too busy.”

One Ring Zero performs its latest cerebral composition Friday and Tuesday in New York. But Hearst is hoping the Tyson mention will propel his geeky band into a more celestially appropriate venue.

“Perhaps it will also help us get a gig at the Hayden Planetarium,” he said. “Our dream is to do a planetarium tour around the country.”

Image courtesy One Ring Zero

See Also:

• Wise Up With The Apples in Stereo’s Space and Time Math-Pop
• Margaret Atwood, Speculative Fiction’s Apocalyptic Optimist
• Neil Gaiman Writes a Final Love Letter to Batman

Authors: Scott Thill

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