Elvis, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley and more's songs land on moon - and some are unreleased

Virgin Radio

27 Feb 2024, 16:19

Songs by Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley and more have been successfully delivered to the moon.

The digitised recordings - some of which are reportedly unreleased tracks - landed on the moon last Thursday as part of the Odysseus space craft’s cargo, Billboard has revealed.

Dallas Santana, who originated the idea of sending an arts-centric time capsule to the moon and curated the project, shared: “This is music that stands the test of time.”

On the subject of the archive of songs - some 25,000 strong - which have now been sent to the Moon, he continued: “Songs that have never been released, ever - they’re on the moon now,” seemingly in reference to some Hendrix recordings which were captured before the formation of The Jimi Hendrix Experience.

“The world will find out about them,” Santana then promised Billboard. He also revealed very few knew about the time capsule project - and that he even kept Space X’s Elon Musk in the dark, despite it being his rocket responsible for getting the collection safely to the moon.

Recordings from artists which also include Marvin Gaye, Janis Joplin and The Who were all featured on board the time capsule which was sent to the moon to act as a general representation of human culture.

Filmmaker Michael P. Nash - whose 2010 climate documentary Climate Refugees is featured on the time capsule - described the project as a “future ancient cave drawing” which will preserve our artistic heritage in the universe “in case we blow ourselves up with a nuclear weapon or a meteor hits us or climatic change wipes us out.”

Alongside the modern music featured in the capsule, historical details such as a Sumerian cuneiform fragment of musical notation also feature. Photos of Woodstock and album art including Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon are also present, as are paintings by Rembrandt and Van Gogh.

The capsule is built of glass, nickel and NanoFiche, and is therefore hoped to outlive us all by lasting millions to billions of years into our future.

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