Mars Rover ‘Curiosity’ Wakes Up With The Beatles & The Doors

August 21, 2012 2:37 PM

IN SPACE – AUGUST 6: In this handout image provided by NASA/JPL-Caltech, a view of Mount Sharp is seen in the distance taken by NASA’s Curiosity rover front hazcam and transmitted to Spaceflight Operations Facility for NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) on August 6, 2012 in Pasadena, California. The MSL Rover named Curiosity is equipped with a nuclear-powered lab capable of vaporizing rocks and ingesting soil, measuring habitability, and whether Mars ever had an environment able to support small life forms called microbe. (Photo by NASA/JPL-Caltech via Getty Images)

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Entertainment, Features, Music

Though The Randells enjoyed a summer-of-’63 with “The Martian Hop,” The Beatles and The Doors have actually made it to the Red Planet.

NASA awakens the Curiosity rover electronically each day with a playlist of ‘wake-up calls’ that include “Good Morning, Good Morning” and “Break on Through.” NASA employee Eric Blood unveiled the playlist of ‘wake-up-calls’ for the remote-controlled robot, which also included the theme tune from Star Wars as well as Frank Sinatra’s “Come Fly With Me,” “Got the Time” by Anthrax, the score of Mission: Impossible and Wagner’s “The Ride of the Valkyries.”

Blood said that the robot was “less cranky with a good wakeup song” which is why all the songs seem to have a positive spin. Doors drummer John Densmore told TMZ, he’s not surprised by the crew’s song selection of “Break on Through” claiming, “The Doors were always considered ‘different’… like from Mars… no bass player, no flower power.”

Not making the rover’s playlist are “Rocket Man” and “Space Oddity.” Follow Curiosity Rover on Twitter @MarsCuriosity.

- Jeffrey Hammond / 98.5 WNCX