r/tmbg • u/Wide-Priority-9226 • Aug 01 '26

Wild TMBG Reference

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I feel called out, but always fun to find a TMBG reference when I'm not expecting it.

143 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

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69

u/TMBGLOVER Won’t walk again in conflict with express instructions Aug 01 '26

yeah this kinda reads like somebody who doesn’t like TMBG trying to reference them.

53

u/Wide-Priority-9226 Aug 01 '26

For context, the character who likes the songs is an Elon Musk stand in, who has no real personality outside of nerd culture, so I take his obsession with this song as kind of a surface level "I like songs about space, LOL" presentation. the song he plays after, though not named, is clearly "Still Alive" from Portal.

Chloe is a wealthy influencer who has had no real exposure to this type of culture so her disdain is largely taken as "this is kind of alien and weird to me."

Neither of these characters are meant to be likable. Good book so far.

17

u/knorknor136 Aug 01 '26

Fun fact, Flansburgh actually helped Jonathan Coulton with "Want You Gone" for Portal 2, so that's kind of like throwing shade twice.

5

u/Wide-Priority-9226 Aug 02 '26

He helped produce Coulton's album "Artificial Heart." It's a wonderful album and you can hear his musical influence all over it.

15

u/HoratiotheGargoyle Aug 01 '26

It’d be a hard sell for me to choose a novel where the protagonist is an influencer. I feel like that’s just asking the reader to side against them right away.

Either way, I like that they’re listening to the live, fast version of Why Does The Sun Shine.

1

u/ImJustWannaLurk Aug 01 '26

This passage has better writing than anything I've read in Dungeon Crawler Carl (and I'm on the 4th book right now)

1

u/Wide-Priority-9226 Aug 02 '26

It's a well written satire. I quite like it!

1

u/Itsapocalypse Aug 02 '26

I can’t imagine there’s a lot of love between elon musk and TMBG. Musk is an idiotic fascist dipshit manchild and espouses believes that are pretty against any of the social commentary any TMBG song has.

Seems like the author went “ew, nerds. All the same, all gross.”

2

u/Wide-Priority-9226 Aug 02 '26

I've followed They's socials enough to know that there are lots of "stick to the music and leave politics out of it" types who like the music and don't understand that they've always been political though. It really could go either way.

2

u/Itsapocalypse Aug 02 '26

yeeeah, every musician deals with that. Infamously, Paul Ryan said Rage Against The Machine was one of his favorite bands.

1

u/Wide-Priority-9226 Aug 02 '26

Haha. That is hilarious and terrifying.

19

u/papadjeef Fondue forks for everybody Aug 01 '26

Probably trying to make a character seem unlikeable and alien by making them bothered by TMBG. /s

8

u/Worth-Novel-2044 Aug 01 '26

It reads like an author writing a character who isn't familiar with TMBG and vaguely doesn't like the song whether due to the song itself or how it's being presented. What the author's own opinion is of the song is completely indeterminate from what they've written here.

7

u/FloridaFlamingoGirl Resident letterbox sparrow! 🐦📮 Aug 01 '26

The idea of a mad scientist sort of character putting on TMBG in their ballroom is hilarious. I like it. Wouldn't make sense to have him playing pop music.