If you don’t know this yet, geek and nerd mean very different things. I’ll let you do a web search and talk to your friends about it, but here are a few thoughts.
- By definition a nerd can’t be cool, but there’s no one to say that geeks can’t be cool. Actually, geeks are the coolest.
- Geeks don’t have to be anti-social, dress funny, or be the prey of bullies. They just are better at science, math, and technology than the average person.
- People are jealous of the geek’s skills and self-confidence. They try to hide it by saying “you are such a geek!”, particularly when the geek shows knowledge that trumps that of the first person.
But… enough about the nerd versus geek debate; let’s get this playlist started. I invite you to add to it!
Math
- Love and Mathematics, Broken Social Scene
- Mathematics of Chaos, Killing Joke
- My Mathematical Mind, Spoon
- Music is Math, Boards of Canada
- Black Math, The White Stripes
- Any song by Math and Physics Club
Science and Technology
- She Blinded Me with Science, Thomas Dolby
- Anything from The Sounds of Science, The Beastie Boys
- Natural Science, Rush
- Weird Science, Oingo Boingo
- Atom Dream, William Orbit
- Anything from Better Living Through Chemistry, Fatboy Slim
- Life is a Gas, from Electric Warrior, T.Rex
- Life on Mars, David Bowie
- Space Oddity, David Bowie
- I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship, David Bowie
- Here on Earth, Love and Rockets
- Holiday on the Moon, Love and Rockets
- Time, Pink Floyd
- Astronomy Domine, Pink Floyd
- Chemistry Class, Elvis Costello & The Attractions
- Rest My Chemistry, Interpol
- Surrealchemist, Stereolab
- President Gas, The Psychedelic Furs
- I’ve Got a Miniature Secret Camera, Peter Murphy
- Computerworld, Kraftwerk
- It’s More Fun to Compute, Kraftwerk again
- Computer Love, Kraftwerk one more time… (maybe they’re simply the geekiest band ever)
- Future in Computer Hell, Junkie XL
- Computer Blue, Prince
- Paranoid Android, or anything from OK Computer, Radiohead
- Technologic, Daft Punk
- Any song by Electronic
- The Electric Co., U2
- Ultraviolet, U2
- Atmosphere, Joy Division
- Invisible Sun, The Police
- Body Electric, The Sisters of Mercy
- Anything from Electric, The Cult
- Electricityscape, The Strokes
- Electrified, and anything else by Electric Boys
- Electricity, Suede
- Electricity, Spiritualized
- Electric Alice, Grinderman (You know Alice the programming language, don’t you? This one scores double.)
- Are Friends Electric?, Gary Numan
- Electric Requiem, Queensrÿche
- Electric Feel, MGMT
- Electric Funeral, Black Sabbath
- She’s Electric, Oasis
- Radar Love, Golden Earring (although the Ministry version sounds better)
- Shooting Star, Lou Reed
- Atari Baby, Sigue Sigue Sputnik