Astronomy

"Astronomy" closes Secret Treaties, 6:28, with music by Albert and Joe Bouchard and lyrics by Pearlman, sung by Bloom. The lyrics are selected verses from Pearlman's poem The Soft Doctrines of Imaginos, about Imaginos, also called Desdinova, guided by alien beings toward the First World War; Wikipedia's article on the song is tagged as needing citations. AllMusic called it one of the most legendary songs in the band's canon.

It exists in several versions: the 1974 studio take, an 8:18 live version on Some Enchanted Evening (1978), a 6:47 version on Imaginos (1988) sung by Buck Dharma, an 8:45 re-recording on Cult Classic (1994) and a 2002 live version of 10:19. The 1988 version was the first single from Imaginos, issued in the United Kingdom in October 1988, with Stephen King recording the spoken introduction; it reached number 12 on Billboard's Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks and did not chart on the Hot 100.

Metallica covered it in 1998 on Garage Inc. Buck Dharma told The Metal Voice that the cover gave the band some cred with the younger generation, Joe Bouchard told Blabbermouth that it changed his life, and Albert Bouchard said in 2021 that for him it is the ultimate version. Arch Enemy reused the chorus in "Pilgrim", and Albert Bouchard's Brain Surgeons recorded it in 1997 with Deborah Frost singing. Which version our upload is has not been checked.