Rockin’ down the highway: 10 songs to get your summer motors running…

10 songs to get your summer motors running…|

With summer upon us and many folks hitting the road for a vacation, or even for a short “staycation,” there’s always the question of, “What will we listen to?” Sometimes the travels take you where the XM or cell service is no more and you need to resort to old-school means, and have a CD or playlist ready. Here are 10 songs that should get you there just in time.

10) “On the Road Again” – Willie Nelson

Originally recorded for the movie Honeysuckle Rose in 1980, which Nelson acted in as well, the song tells the story of a young country singer trying to juggle his life on the road and his family while he searches for the “big time.” The tune got nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song, ironically, to be beaten by the song “Fame,” from a movie about artists that did make it big. “I just can’t wait to get on the road again…”

9) “Take It Easy” – The Eagles

The signature song by the Eagles was actually written by Jackson Browne, who was an upstairs neighbor at the time in the apartments where Glenn Frey lived. Frey was a session player in Los Angeles and Linda Ronstadt’s manager plucked him, Randy Meisner and Bernie Leadon from Ronstadt’s band to form a new band, the Eagles. Browne gave them a partially written song and Frey wrote the famous second verse line, “I was standin’ on a corner in Winslow, Arizona.” We don’t think Winslow has been the same since.

8) “Ukiah” – The Doobie Brothers

This one is a personal pick. The Doobie Brothers have many tunes that would be perfect road trip music - “Cross City Midnight Lady” and “Rockin’ Down the Highway,” to name a couple. A few years back, as we were on our way to the Kate Wolf Memorial Music Festival and had a six-disc mix going in the car, and just as we came down the 101 into Ukiah, this song came on. How on earth did it know? We had goose bumps all the way through town.

7) “Jessica” – The Allman Brothers

The title is never mentioned, as the song is an instrumental, but the moment you hear it you’ll become instantly reacquainted. Written by Dickey Betts for the “Brothers and Sisters” album, the disc put the band back on the charts after the death of founding brother Duane Allman and bassist Barry Oakley, who would each die within three blocks of each other in separate motorcycle accidents one year apart. Although not near the crash site, in 1988 the Georgia legislature named a section of State Highway 19 “Duane Allman Boulevard,” right near the “Raymond Berry Oakley III” bridge. The song is named after Betts’s daughter and in 2006 the Wall Street Journal declared it a “a true national heirloom.”

6) “Radar Love” – Golden Earring

“I’ve been driving all night my hands are wet on the wheel…” goes the first line to the 1973 hit for the Dutch act that was actually re-mastered from a much longer version from an earlier European release. The album “Moontan” was aimed at the emerging American FM radio audience and to even have a song from the disc that charted on AM on the Billboard charts as high as 13 was a surprise. The band would not chart again until 1982 with “Twilight Zone.” Another Dutch band you may recall, the Shocking Blue, topped the American charts with “Venus” in 1970. The Dutch would not tread onto the American charts again until the late1980s with Adrian Vandenburg’s self titled band Vandenburg.

5) “Highway Star” – Deep Purple

The story has this road tune actually being written on the road, in a tour bus in 1971 after a reporter asked Ritchie Blackmore, guitarist for the band, how they go about writing songs. He said “like this…” and began to write it and finished it on the bus that day, Deep Purple, which at that time held the title in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s loudest rock band, performed it at that night’s show. The song became the opening number for the band for most of their performances over the next 30 years.

4) “Layla” – Derek and the Dominos

The short-lived project that featured Eric Clapton and Duane Allman, produced one of the most memorable rock riffs in history, featured at the beginning of the song. The album, released in 1970, was bashed by the critics and did not achieve the acclaim it would in later years. The project was marred with problems from the outset and heavy drug use eventually tore the band apart. “Layla” was released as a single in the U.S. in 1972 and rose to No.10 on the Billboard charts and the album has since been named by many as Clapton’s finest work.

3) “Goin’ Down the Road” – The Grateful Dead

Originally written by Woody Guthrie, the song has been covered by many acts - the Dead, the Allman Brothers and many “jam” bands. The Dead we’re the original jam band, taking short versions of songs and stretching them into long “jams.” Some of the modern jam bands include Widespread Panic, Phish and Gov’t Mule. This tune makes any road trip that much shorter. After a few bars you’ll be singing along.

2) “Roadhouse Blues” – The Doors

“Keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel” belts Jim Morrison in this classic road tune that was originally released as a B-side for the single “You Make Me Real.” The song was recorded over a two-day period in 1969 that featured guitarist Lonnie Mack on bass and John Sebastian on harmonica, playing under a pseudonym for contract reasons. The song has since been covered by many including Blue Oyster Cult, Mahogany Rush, Velvet Revolver and, essentially, every two-bit cover band in the country.

1) “Freebird” – Lynyrd Skynyrd

Really, just about any Lynyrd Skynyrd song could be in the road mix. Many program directors of radio stations in the ‘70s claim that “Freebird” was the most requested song of that decade, even surpassing Led Zeppelin’s classic “Stairway to Heaven.” Lynyrd Skynyrd made records for only four years before the plane crash that took the lives of front-man Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines and others members of the band’s entourage in 1977, yet the music lives on. The band plays on to this day, with one original member and various members of other southern rock acts.

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