I personally don’t know of anyone that doesn’t like music. Do you? To me music is powerful. It can lift you up, inspire you, make you sad, make you want to dance and can take you back in time just to name a few of the things.
One of the best things that I like to do when traveling is listening to music to pass the time away. Who doesn’t like to listen and sing to Marvin Gaye, Billy Joel, the Eagles, and Huey Lewis and the News while going 80 mph down the road?
Ok, I may be one of the few people, but that’s how I like to roll.
Summer Trip
This past winter, Bob Earle, who is my best friend from college and the best man at my wedding, told me that he was going to retire. He wanted to know if I would be up for a trip with him in the summer.
I told him that would be a lot of fun and after Tonya gave me the green light, we ended up planning a two week trip.
We flew into Denver. We spent 3 days in Denver, two days in Moab, Utah, 2 days in Salt Lake City, 2 days in Jackson Hole, 3 days in McAllister, Montana, 1 day in Sheridan, Wyoming and 1 day in Rapid City before driving back to Denver on our last day to fly home.
On the trip, we visited 6 national parks and one national battlefield along with many other sites along the way. In total, we drove over 4,000 miles. It truly was a blast and an unforgettable trip in more ways than one.
Spotify Playlist
For most of the trip, we listened to my Spotify playlist. I only have one playlist on Spotify and it has over 34 hours of music. Basically, you could drive from Sugarcreek, OH where I live to Los Angeles, CA and not hear the same song twice.
My list consists mostly of 60s, 70s, and 80s music. You are going to hear R&B, rock, disco, Motown, pop, soul, new wave, funk, folk, TV theme songs, a little country and some rap when you listen to my playlist.
Who Sang that Song?
Bob loves, loves, loves music and he is a great singer. His sweet spot when it comes to music is rock but he appreciates and likes other genres.
A few days into our 14 day trip, Bob said that he would try to name who was singing the song. I thought that would be a lot of fun. As we drove down the road, Bob started to name who was singing the song. Some of the songs were easy, for example, Phil Collins, Men at Work, and Journey.
He then started to name artists/groups who were one hit wonders from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. I was very impressed by his knowledge. I didn’t know quite a few of those artists.
There were songs that he would have to think about but he would name who was singing the song almost every time. To say the least, I was taken a little aback. I thought that I was driving with the “Rain Man” of who sang that song.
Many of the songs that he was getting right weren’t in areas of music that he would normally listen to. Sometimes he would be stumped and I would have to tell him but that was extremely rare.
The Buffalo is Out of the Bag
So, on the last day of our trip we were driving from Rapid City to Denver to catch our flight home. When I say we were driving, it was actually Bob.
On the way out to Denver, I lost my driver’s license. I put my license in my sweatpants pocket after going through TSA instead of my bag. I believe that it fell out of my pocket when I was sitting down.
So, Bob did all of the driving on the trip. I called him “Jeezes” since he was my driver for the two weeks of the trip. About halfway to Denver, Bob looked at me and told me that he needed to tell me something.
He said, “Do you see this button on the steering wheel? When I push the button, the name of the song and the artist is displayed on the dash in front of me.”
I can’t tell you exactly what I said to him at the time but it probably wasn’t very nice. We did have a good laugh about the whole thing.
I should have guessed that something like that was happening. Both of the cars that I drive do the same thing but they display it in the middle display of the car.
Plus, if I was able to drive I would like to think that I would have figured it out. His knowledge of songs would have dipped tremendously when I was driving.
As I think about that last statement, it may not be totally accurate. Bob has the Shazam app on his phone. It tells you what song is playing and I know he would have tried using it.
The trip was memorable for many reasons. I guess this was just one more thing to look back on and to remember to “Let the Good Times Roll.” I believe that is the Cars.
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