Complete History Of The Soviet Union, Arranged To The Melody Of Tetris

Miscellaneous General
1

Just wanted to raise awareness for this fantastic song that’s going viral these days, at least in my part of the social networking sphere. It’s called

Complete History Of The Soviet Union, Arranged To The Melody Of Tetris

and is the work of a musical act called Pig With The Face Of A Boy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWTFG3J1CP8

A lighthearted topic perhaps, but this reminds me a bit of the “Fear the boom and bust” rap video. Using Tetris as a metaphor for the endless toil of the workers is great(plusthe Tetris theme is just a great little melody), and there are vague hints of the coordination problem - the line “they come two weeks late and they don’t tessalate/but we are working to Stalin’s five year plan” is just great. The endless game of Tetris is a sort of an expanded version of the problem of the bricklayer and his house, no? If you get nothing but one type of piece, your game will end soon…

Lyrics:

To Moscow I came seeking fortune
But they’re making me work til I’m dead
The bourgeoisie have it so easy
The Tsar’s putting gold on his bread
The people of Moscow are hungry
But think what a feast there could be
If we could create a socialist state
That cared for the people like me:

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That descend upon me from up above.
They come down and I spin them around
Til they fit in the ground like hand in glove.
Sometimes it seems that to move blocks is fine
And the lines will be formed as they fall -
Then I see that I have misjudged it!
I should not have nudged it after all.
Can I have a long one please?
Why must these infernal blocks tease?

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
Come Muscovite! Let the workers unite!
A collective regime of peace and love.
I work so hard in arranging the blocks
But the landlord and taxman bleed me dry
But the workers will rise! We will not compromise
For we know that the old regime must die.
Long live Lenin, kill the tsar!
We salute the sickle and star!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
The food on your plate now belongs to the state
A collective regime of peace and love.
I have no choice in arranging the blocks
Under Bolshevik rule, what they say goes.
The rule of the game is we all are the same
And my blocks must create unbroken rows.
Long live Stalin! He loves you!
Sing these words, or you know what he’ll do…

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are made by the men in Kazakhstan.
They come two weeks late and they don’t tessellate
But we’re working to Stalin’s five year plan.
I am the man who arranges the tanks
That will make all the Nazis keep away
The Fuhrer is dead, and Europe is Red!
Let us point all our guns at the USA.
We shall live forever more!
We can start a nuclear war!

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That are building a highly secret base.
Hip hip hurrah for the USSR!HIP
We are sending our men to outer space.
I work so hard in arranging the blocks
But each night I go home to my wife in tears -
What’s the point of it all, when you’re building a wall
And in front of your eyes it disappears?
Pointless work for pointless pay
This is one game I shall not play.

I am the man who arranges the blocks!
But tomorrow I think I’ll stay in bed.
The winter is cold, I’ve got plenty of gold
And I’m standing in line for a loaf of bread
Maybe we’d be better off
If we brought down Gorbachev

I am the man who arranges the blocks
That continue to fall from up above.
The markets are free! So much money for me!
Tell me, why should I care for peace and love?
The markets are free! So much money for me!
Tell me, why should I care for peace and love?
Peace and love, peace and love!

And now the wall is down, the Marxists frown
There’s foreign shops all over town
When in Red Square, well don’t despair
There’s Levi’s and McDonald’s there
The US gave us crystal meth
And Yeltsin drank himself to death
But now that Putin’s put the boot in,
Who’ll get in our way?

So we reject free enterprise
And once again the left will rise.
Prepare the flags to be unfurled
For we’re seceding from the world:
We shall regain the Georgian soil
We shall obtain the Arctic oil
We shall arrange the blocks and toil
Forever and a day.

Game over.

2

I’ll never look at Tetris the same again…

3

For anyone who cares the actual title is called “Korobeyniki” (Коробейники) which means “beggers” or “tramps”. It’s an old Russian folk song written by poet Nikolay Nekrasov. He was the publisher of both Turgenev and Dostoyevky among others.

4

Thanks for the info Dondoolee! It sure is a catchy melody isn’t it?

The story of how Tetris rose to such great heights of popularity(it was one of the earliest cross-platform “blockbuster” video game) is actually a great case for the abolition of IP - it was ported from some Soviet computer system to the MS-DOS operating system by a friend of the original author, who wrote it more as an intellectual exercise rather than a money-making venture, and somehow it made it’s way via diskette traders from the Soviet Union to Hungary. From there it spread across the world and was “cloned” onto just about every OS in existence at the time, since nobody in the western world actually held the intellectual rights to the code, although we have Nintendo of Japan to thank for the addition of the folk tune as the main theme of the game when they released their version of it for the original Game Boy.

.

5

love it! Almost as epic as Hayek vs Keynes ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0nERTFo-Sk )

6

The lyrics are interesting. But the music and singing, as well as the video, are a bit grating. Gave me a headache.

7

What Georgian soil?

8

I thought the music, singing, and video were all highly enjoyable. I’ve watched it 3 times now.

9

I’ve listened to it about 7 times now and saved it to my favorites. It’s so catchy!

10

A reference to the rescue/reclamation/annexation of South Ossetia.

11

I know what it is a reference to. The lyrics are false. Neither is Putin a leftist, nor did the Soviet Communism ever claim to be about “love”.

12

I didn’t know that the United States actually created crystal meth and were so deviant in passing it on to Russia. Do I smell a cold war tactic!? Russian too high to fight?

13

Fat chance.

14

This is another keeper. On par with Papola’s “Keynes and Hayek”. I like how they both subtlely mix in advanced economic concepts.

15

This is so awesome.

16

This is just so catchy and ridiculously clever. I love it.

17

My wife looked at me like I was crazy this morning when I said firmly “I am the man who arranges the blocks!” to myself…

Good song, but now I can’t get it out of my head :slight_smile:

Thanks for sharing!

18

In Soviet Russia blocks arrange you!

19

Also interesting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpj3SDeAoO8