Astronaut's Playlist: 145 Songs About Stars, Planets, and Space
Space is often a metaphor for uncertainty and the unknown. If you love the moon, stars, and space, customize your own playlist of songs that reference the galaxy.
A Playlist That's Out of This World
You're either fascinated with space, or you just don't get what the fuss is all about. After all, people tend to look outward or inward.
If meteors, asteroids, and other galaxies intrigue you, and you think rocketry and NASA astronauts are about as cool as rock stars, then this playlist is right up your planetary alley!
Songs About Stars, Planets, and Space
We've gathered rock, country, classic, R&B, and reggae favorites that reference all things space. Celebrate your love of the stars, planets, and outer space with a customized playlist.
1. "You're a Sky Full of Stars" by Coldplay
The man in this 2014 pop tune is falling in love and thus making himself vulnerable. His sweetheart brings light to his world like a sky full of stars.
2. "Counting Stars" by OneRepublic
The narrator in this catchy 2013 pop rock release is tired of pursuing material happiness. Rather, he wants to be more open to life's possibilities, to focus on the good things he has going for him, and live more freely. He's counting his stars.
"Space flights are merely an escape, a fleeing away from oneself, because it is easier to go to Mars or to the moon than it is to penetrate one's own being." - Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist
NASA Goddard Space Flight via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0, modified by GAES_STEM
3. "Fly Me to the Moon" by Frank Sinatra
In this 1954 classic tune, Ole' Blue Eyes is smitten with a woman whose love feels otherworldly:
Fly me to the moon
Let me play among the stars
Let me see what spring is like on
A-Jupiter and Mars.
4. "Drops of Jupiter (Tell Me)" by Train
A Grammy award winner, this 2001 pop track was inspired by the death of the lead singer's mother. He envisions her returning to him to deliver messages of peace and love:
Now that she's back in the atmosphere
With drops of Jupiter in her hair, hey, hey
She acts like summer and walks like rain
Reminds me that there's time to change, hey, hey.
5. "Lucky Star" by Madonna
In this upbeat dance hit from 1983, Madonna refers to her boyfriend as a star who lights her world up:
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You must be my lucky star
'Cause you make the darkness seem so far
And when I'm lost you'll be my guide
I just turn around and you're by my side.
6. "Rocket Man" by Elton John
Has anyone thought that being an astronaut is just another 9-to-5 job? This 1972 rock hit is one of Elton John's signature songs. It describes the loneliness of being an astronaut in outer space, separated from those you love.
7. "All of the Stars" by Ed Sheeran
A man is separated by great distance from his sweetheart in this 2014 pop number, but he sees that the sky full of stars bridges the distance between them. The stars will guide her back to him.
"Astronomy compels the soul to look upward, and leads us from this world to another." - Plato, ancient Greek philosopher
Amber Ingram via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0
8. "Space Truckin'" by Deep Purple
This 1972 heavy metal song describes what it would be like to be bouncing around the galaxy, visiting far reaches of the solar system, and groovin' with aliens from other planets.
9. "We Are All Made of Stars" by Moby
Despite the differences among people, we have one basic commonality, according to this 2002 electronic/dance tune: we're made of the same cosmic ingredients:
People they come together
People they fall apart
No one can stop us now
'Cause we are all made of stars.
"Be humble for you are made of earth. Be noble for you are made of stars." - Serbian proverb
Tom Hall via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0, modified by GAES_STEM
10. "Starlight" by Muse
The protagonist in this 2006 alternative rock song imagines that a spaceship is taking him away from everyone he knows and loves. Far away, across "black holes and revelations," he will never let go of the memory of the special woman he loves.
11. "Space Cowboy" by Steve Miller Band
The guy in this 1969 rock release may have his feet on this rock we call Earth, but his head is somewhere in the clouds. He sounds like he's been sipping rocket fuel or something:
I'm a space cowboy
Bet you weren't ready for that
I'm a space cowboy
I'm sure you know where it's at.
12. "Walking on the Moon" by Cas Haley
This 2008 reggae-inspired remake of The Police classic is catchy and features a man who romantically ponders what moon walking with his beau might be like:
Giant steps are what you take
Walking on the moon
I hope my legs don't break
Walking on the moon
We could walk forever
Walking on the moon
We could live together
Walking on, walking on the moon.
"Every cubic inch of space is a miracle." - Walt Whitman, American poet
Blondinrikard Fröberg via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0, modified by GAES_STEM
13. "The Final Countdown" by Europe
This 1986 hard rock track by the Swedish group Europe was a worldwide hit and has since been used at sporting events to energize crowds. The lyrics imagine a spaceflight bound for Venus, on a trip where there's no going back.
Why our space program? Why, indeed, did we trouble to look past the next mountain? Our prime obligation to ourselves is to make the unknown known. We are on a journey to keep an appointment with whatever we are.
— Gene Roddenberry, American television producer
14. "Space Oddity" by David Bowie
Released just days before the launch of Apollo 11—the shuttle with the first manned moon landing—this 1969 song was David Bowie's first hit, and it became a signature song. The song is about an imaginary astronaut's troubled space trip, which leaves him floating helplessly above the Earth and moon.
15. "Stars & Moon" by Breathe Carolina & Shanahan (Featuring Haliene)
This 2016 electronic number speaks about a sweet epiphany. A woman acknowledges the depths of her feelings for her sweetheart by telling him that he is everything in the world to her:
You are like a new sunrise
You have opened up my eyes
There's nothing in the world like you
You're my stars and moon.
16. "E.T." by Katy Perry
Katy Perry is in love with a guy who is an alien, a supernatural extraterrestrial from a whole different world. She says that his kiss is cosmic and she wants to follow him to his strange universe. Hmmm. What will her mother say about this guy she brought home?
17. "Spaceman" by The Killers
This 2008 alt/indie number involves an alien abduction in which a man is ripped from his bed and subjected to strange tests and procedures. Although the spaceman tries to convince him the experience was all in his mind, he knows the whole thing was real.
"Unknowingly, we plow the dust of stars, blown about us by the wind, and drink the universe in a glass of rain." - Ihab Hassan, Arab American writer
Joel Tonyan via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0, modified by GAES_STEM
18. "Andromeda" by Paul Weller
The Andromeda is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way. The two galaxies may have collided three billion years ago and could do so again in the future. In this 2010 song, an intergalactic space traveler departs Andromeda for another world yet knows he may die before he gets there.
19. "Bad Moon Rising" by Creedence Clearwater Revival
Named one to Rolling Stone's list of the Greatest 500 Songs of All Time, this 1969 classic hit has been recorded by more than 20 artists in styles as diverse as psychedelic, folk, and rock. However, CCR, the originators, sang it best. The song is supposed to be about "the apocalypse that was going to be visited upon us."
"Two things inspire me to awe — the starry heavens above and the moral universe within." - Albert Einstein, German-born theoretical physicist
NASA Goddard Space Flight via Flickr, CC-BY-SA 2.0, modified by GAES_STEM
20. "Total Eclipse Of The Heart" by Bonnie Tyler
An eclipse occurs when one celestial body (like the sun) obscures the light from another (like the moon). It's a 1983 rock power ballad about the desperation of love that isn't returned as fully as one would wish: