Wit & Wisdom: Jonathan Coulton

THE SADDEST SONG in the world is called "Code Monkey," and it's by Jonathan Coulton.

The Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter is something of an anomoly in the pop world. And in the indie world. And in the novelty-music world. He's a serious composer with a beautiful voice who writes about alien robots keeping human slaves, a giant squid having a crise de conscience, the father of fractal geometry and, in the case of "Code Monkey," the ineffible sorrow of a software cubicle jockey with love and Fritos on his mind.

So, the songs are funny. "Ha, ha!" you say. And you never see it coming until your heart breaks into a kajillion pieces.

Coulton acknowledges that his songs have layers. "People will hear something like 'Re: Your Brain,'" he says, referring to a tune about zombies on the loose in a white-collar office "Obviously, that's a novelty song. But I think when you're only paying attention to the zombie layer, you're like, "Oh, that guy's weird." Then you realize it's about having a crappy job and hating your co-workers."

Coulton knows from office culture, a frequent text for his music; he toiled at a software job until, in 2005, something cracked. He quit to work full-time at becoming what he facetiously calls "an Internet rock star." He told the wife, of course. ("She was, like, 'Gulp. OK.'") then he started Thing-a-Week, a song series that would soak up the endless supply of ideas swirling in his brain.

Five weeks in, he ran out of ideas.

"So, in desperatation, I decided I'd do a cover of "Baby Got Back," which was something my wife suggested. It felt a little cheap to me. ... But I think credit has got to go to Sir Mix-a-Lot, because not only is it wickedly funny, there is an important message in there about body image. Not to get all intellectual."

The strummy cover of the lascivious hip-hop tune became Coulton's Internet calling card, and now his site, his accessibility to fans — who post imaginative videos for his songs — and his technological savvy have raised a veritable army of people who like rhyming "pterodactyl" with "fractal."

"I don't mind being lumped in with "nerdcore,'" he says, "because it means there's somebody who considers himself a nerdcore fan. There are all these little denominations that I'm happy to have describe me."

At the Birchmere on Friday, where Coulton appears along with Paul + Storm, you can make up your own.

Birchmere, 3701 Mt. Vernon Ave., Alexandria; Fri., 7:30 p.m., $20; 703-549-7500.

Photo courtesy Dale May