Cameron Mackintosh knew it as he headed towards the hospital. Mysterious brain-rot was slowly devouring the wondrous organ that had brokered more 75-dollar disappointments than Heidi Fleiss.
At the hospital, Cameron was escorted into a dim room. As if on cue, the other occupants quietly left, leaving him alone with the dying genius. A husk of a voice broke the silence.
"Here to celebrate, John Simon?"
"No, Andrew, it's Cameron. I'm here."
"I have one last gift for you. A final work so wonderful that it makes all my previous musicals pale by comparison."
Mackintosh perked up. Any Lloyd Webber musical was guaranteed to make him millions, especially one from the deathbed. Lloyd Webber reached under his soiled mattress and produced two sheafs of paper.
"This first packet is the libretto. The other contains the music information."
Brushing aside the strained carrots, Mackintosh saw the logo:
"During my long stay here, I've listened to the radio, Cameron. And I've discovered that certain snippets of old pop music, when mixed in a certain order, can become far greater than the original songs they were taken from. Every individual line in my new musical was written by a different genius of modern music. Combined....oh, oh.... I make poo-poo."
"He's completely lost it," thought Mackintosh. "Still, it'll make millions. I mean, people paid to see "Aspects of Love," didn't they?"
"Thank you, Andrew. I'm sure that it will serve your memory proudly."
Mackintosh got up to leave, cradling the libretto and score. Lloyd Webber sat up with a start, as though awakening from a sudden nightmare.
"Don't forget to get permission to use those songs. If you think brain rot is rough, wait until you deal with ASCAP's lawyers."
Then, whistling the overture to "Sunset Boulevard" (or "Phantom of the Opera" or "Cats"-- even Mackintosh couldn't be sure), Andrew Lloyd Webber's pucker grew ever fainter. The fat lady had sung.
As Mackintosh left the room, an unfortunate accident involving an incontinent chihuahua, a low-hanging ceiling fan and a pile of butter-rum candies struck. (Space precludes us from going into details). But when Mackintosh came to, while the lyrics were thankfully intact, only a few confetti-like scraps remained of what had once been the musical score.
But he is a resourceful gentleman - you must be to make a huge hit out of dancing cats - and Mackintosh remembered hearing of a group of pop-culture experts who gathered twice a year. Surely THEY could help identify these isolated song lyrics, thereby enabling Mackintosh to reconstruct the music!
Give the song and artist for each individual line in each song. Once each line has been identified, we will be receiving 8% of the Broadway royalties, and 35% of the gross recording rights.
You? You'll get some points.