Road trip music

I have been taking 2000-4000 road trips since the 70s. My brother and I labeled music we like to listen to "Running down the road music", after Jackson Browne's Take It Easy (no, NOT the Eagles). Back in the day I would make cassette mix tapes for this purpose. But now I still play CDs in my cars each having a 12 CD changer. Of course the music I like to take with me is a dynamic list. On the longer trips I take up to 5 12-CD cartridges full. But here is a short list of CDs I like to take with me:

Barenaked Ladies---Rock Spectacle.
Counting Crows---August And Everything After
Wallflowers---Bringing Down The Horse
Better Than Ezra---Closer
The Waifs---A Brief History Of
Tim Finn, Bic Runga, Dave Dobbyn---Together In Concert
Neil Finn And Friends---7 Worlds Collide
Tonic---Lemon Parade
Fuel---Sunburn
Filter---Title Of Record
Dishwalla---Pet Your Friends
Feist---The Reminder
Regina Spektor---Begin To Hope
PJ Harvey---Stories From The City/Sea

I like to play the 12 CD cartridge on "random" to not be able to anticipate the next song.
I suppose I could start making "thumb drive" mixes. But I am too lazy to rip CDs. Maybe someday.

What are some of your favorite road trip albums regardless of format?

 

The Doors - first LP
The Who - Who’s Next
Neil Young - Live Rust

 

Cheap Thrills

 

I have an active smart playlist on my iPod called "Catchup" that has every song I've added into my library with a play count of 0. It currently stands at 3639 songs, the oldest being uploaded on July 11 of last year. I just play that on shuffle whenever we take a road trip. Which in fact we're doing starting tomorrow, so I should go sync it.

 

That sounds like fun. I am fetching a car I have agreed to buy next week. I will have to put a 15 or so CDs in my flight bag for the trip home. (no changer in this car yet).

 

Dude. I used to haul around boxes of CD's just for a drive across town.

Get a USB stick ($8), and you can load tons of albums on it. Plugs into most car CD players. I stared at that USB input for years before I realized what it was for...it's a hassle to build your library, but it will pay off.

The fancier move would be the cloud library thing as mentioned above, but I won't grasp that tech for another ten years..

 

Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska (especially on winter day and driving in landscape through small villages/
Dead Can Dance ‎– Spleen And Ideal
Johnny Cash ‎– Sings The Ballads Of The True West
Terje Rypdal ‎– After The Rain (ECM JAZZ
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds ‎– The Good Son

 

I am dealing with OEM equipment in 20 year old cars, no USB port. I DO have a nice Tascam CD-200SB that would allow me to copy CDs directly to a thumb drive, but I have not gotten enough enthusiasm to even try it yet. If I ever do, I will buy a stereo head unit for one of my cars to take advantage of USB playback. I find as I get older, I am less willing to put in the effort to even make mix CD-Rs which I used to LOVE to do.

 

No road trip music arsenal is complete without Taj Mahal's self-titled 1968 debut LP. I once drove from Toronto to Kentucky and had that in the ENTIRE way. Timeless!

 

I always grab these:

Led Zeppelin- The Song Remains the Same
Neil Young - On the Beach
AC/DC - Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
Matthew Sweet - Girlfriend
Alice Cooper- Greatest Hits
Yes- Fragile

 

I Can Hear the Heart Beat as One - Yo La Tengo
Life on Planet Eartsnop - Myracle Brah
Dusk at Cubist Castle - Olivia Tremor Control
and just about any Beatles

 

I don’t bring along the actual CDs with me (unless it’s an extra copy, that is just a $1 thrift store find...)

That’s what a CDr is meant for... if you drop it on the car floor, if it rolls onto the pebbly pavement, then you’re not lamenting the gravelly scratches. that’s life!

 

I'm getting tired of burning comp discs for my auto and was thinking about picking up one of these bluetooth receivers.
I'm not concerned about SQ in a car so mp3's on a thumb or sd card would be fine for me.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B077KX1ZD6/ref=ox_sc_sfl_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A1VCRDPIX0NQ5B

 

I have done it by era:

50s: Chuck, Bo, Elvis, Gene, Buddy, Lil Richard, etc., deep rockabilly, doo wop, R&B cuts, gives you a time warp when you get in and out of the car

60s: Strictly US groups/artists: CCR, Doors, Velvets, Spirit, Hendrix, Moby Grape, Dylan, Byrds, BBoys, Baez, Buf Sprgfld, Sly Stone, Love, etc., plus lots of Motown, Stax, Atlantic, Loma, etc., soul mixed in

70s: go hard and heavy: Sabbath, Stooges, Zep, Humble Pie, MC5, Purple, Free, Budgie, Foghat, Lizzy, Nazareth, Skynyrd, etc.,

70s: strictly soul and /or funk

 

I'll limit it to 10 (1 per artist)
Gerry Rafferty - North and South
Counting Crows---August And Everything After (tick), also Hard Candy
Wallflowers---Bringing Down The Horse (tick)
Paul Kelly - Gossip
Springsteen Live Archives (Most)
Jayhawks - Hollywood Town Hall
Waking Hours - Del Amitri
Gold - Ryan Adams
Circus Animals - Cold Chisel
Scarecrow - John Mellencamp

 

The Cars - first album
Cheap Trick - At Budokan
Electric Light Orchestra - A New World Record

 

For me, it has to be Neil Young's Live Rust, ideally on a cassette player. Ah, good times....

EDIT: Although my wife would make a good case for Wilco's Sky Blue Sky as well.

 

For me, the playlist in city driving is far different than highway driving or rural routes.

 

Fleetwood Mac - Live in Boston 1970 3cd set

 

Beck - Sea Change and Odeley

 

I limited myself to a top ten:

Tom Petty - "Runnin' Down a Dream"
Tupac/Dr. Dre - "California Love"
Bruce Springsteen - "Born to Run"
Elton John - "I'm Still Standing"
Lee Ann Womack - "I Hope You Dance"
Red Hot Chili Peppers - "Californication"
Miranda Lambert - "Vice"
Guns N' Roses - "Sweet Child O' Mine"
Simon & Garfunkel - "Mrs. Robinson"
Warren G - "Regulate"

 

Dire Straits - Communique
Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers
Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
U2 - Achtung Baby
Porcupine Tree - Stupid Dream
Van Morrison - Greatest Hits
Marillion - Clutching at Straws
Jane's Addiction - From The Catacombs
Jackie Brown OST
Morphine - Cure For Pain

 

These are my go to cassettes for long road trips:

Aerosmith - Greatest Hits
Black Sabbath - We Sold Our Soul for Rock and Roll
Def Leppard - Vault
Foreigner - Records
Golden Earring - The Continuing Story of Radar Love
Journey - Escape
Journey - Frontiers
Ozzy Osbourne - Live & Loud
Poison - Open Up and Say Ahhh!
REO Speedwagon - Hi Infidelity
Survivor - Vital Signs

 

Graceland is the family get out of town music.

 

A tune where the bass player gets to sing.

REO Speedwagon - Back on the Road Again (Live - 2010).