Kirk meets Kink on new Shatner album

"Star Trek" legend William Shatner announces the guest/song list for his next album, and it includes the likes of Strokes guitarist Nick Valensi, Funkadelic bassist Bootsy Collins, and undersung Kink brother Dave Davies.

Edward Moyer Senior Editor

Edward Moyer is a senior editor at CNET and a many-year veteran of the writing and editing world. He enjoys taking sentences apart and putting them back together. He also likes making them from scratch. ¶ For nearly a quarter of a century, he's edited and written stories about various aspects of the technology world, from the US National Security Agency's controversial spying techniques to historic NASA space missions to 3D-printed works of fine art. Before that, he wrote about movies, musicians, artists and subcultures.

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Edward Moyer

April 16, 2011 3:24 p.m. PT

2 min read

The Dave Davies collaboration isn't the first time Shatner has been associated with Kinkiness. The "Futurama" character (and Shatner/Captain Kirk homage) Zapp Brannigan once performed a version of the Kinks klassic "Lola." Fox Broadcasting

Everybody's favorite barrel-chested starship commander and "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" interpreter, William Shatner, has announced the list of guest artists and songs for his new album, "Searching for Major Tom."

And it looks like the "Star Trek" legend has been joined in the studio by, among others, Strokes guitarist Nick Valensi, Funkadelic bassist Bootsy Collins, talk-box virtuoso Peter Frampton, and power chord superhero and undersung Kink brother Dave Davies.

The guest list reads like a classic-rock who's who, with other honorary crew members including Johnny Winter, Alan Parsons, and more than one member of Deep Purple and Yes.

And the set of songs for this high-concept collection is equally likely to conjure up memories of FM radio (or MTV), with tunes like Steve Miller's "Space Cowboy," Norman Greenbaum's "Spirit in the Sky," Black Sabbath's "Iron Man," Duran Duran's "Planet Earth," Thomas Dolby's "She Blinded Me With Science," and--wow--Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" (hope Shatner and Co. re-create the video).

There's an intriguing tease too: a song called "Mrs. Major Tom" will feature an as-yet-unnamed female singer as guest artist. Grace Slick? Grace Jones? Pat Benatar? Nona Hendryx? Missing Persons' lead singer Dale Bozzio? Or how about Bjork? Or Lady Gaga? (that would truly be a coup).

Shatner has built quite a nice little musical/performance reputation for himself in the decades since the 1968 release of the cult classic "The Transformed Man." He's inspired homages on both "The Simpsons" and "Futurama"; performed selected tweets by Sarah Palin on "The Tonight Show" (a compliment Palin returned by appearing on the show herself and reading excerpts from Shatner's autobiography); collaborated on a ballet with Ben Folds, Henry Rollins, and Margo Sappington; and performed Frank Sinatra's "My Way" with a chorus line of "Star Wars" storm troopers; among many other things.

You can find the complete guest/song list for "Searching for Major Tom" here. The album is set to be released later this year on Cleopatra Records. Until then, don your Kirk uniform and lip-synch to this artfully produced vid of a classic Shatner performance.

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