Greatest. Roadtrip Soundtrack. Ever.

He also loved obscure Australian folk music. Which normally wouldn’t have been a big deal. To each their own right? Except here’s the thing: he also figured the rest of us should love it as well and blared it over the bus speakers.

I remember most of us tried to endure it. But you can only take so many repetitions of Waltzing Matilda and “jumbucks” from “tuckerbags” before you start fantacizing about kicking in the cd player.

To be fair, Two Dogs asked us if we had any music we wanted to hear. Sadly, I had a cd wallet full of my own various favourite bands, but nothing that offered a quality hour or so of roadtrip music. Neither did anyone else.

I remember Two Dogs shrugged his shoulders, said something like “Fair Dinkum” and resumed playing his Australian folk music.

From that moment, I vowed to create the greatest roadtrip cd ever, which I would carry with me in case I was ever called upon again. And so I did.

The following is the track listing for the Greatest Roadtrip Cd Ever (capitalization intentional).

Though there are a few tracks that probably wouldn’t have made the cut today, I stand by this musical compilation as the closest anyone has ever come to roadtrip soundtrack enlightenment.

• 1. ACDC – Highway To Hell
• 2. The Hives – Hate To Say I Told You So
• 3. Blink 182 – Damnit
• 4. Matthew Good – Rico
• 5. Supergrass – Pumpin On Your Stereo
• 6. Offspring – Get A Job
• 7. Bryan Adams – Summer of 69
• 8. Wheatus – Teenage Dirtbag
• 9. Crash Test Dummies – Peter Pumpkinhead
• 10. Spin Doctors – Two Princes
• 11. Violent Femmes – American Music
• 12. Rancid – Ruby
• 13. Tom Cochrane – Life Is A Highway
• 14. REM – It’s the End of the World
• 15. Third Eye Blind – Semi-Charmed Life
• 16. John Mellencamp – Small Town
• 17. Coldplay – Yellow
• 18. Tom Petty – Free Fallin
• 19. U2 – With Or Without You
• 20. Neil Diamond – Cherry
• 21. Mr. Big – To Be With You

Now I’d be foolish to assume that music is a relative matter.

But, for a roadtrip song to even be considered, it must possess one or all of the following qualities: a head bobbing beat, a scream-at-the-top-of-your-lungs chorus, or the ability to evoke feelings of wide-open roads and a never-ending horizon.

With that said, I’d like to open up the comments here to ask you:

What music do you deem essential for your favourite roadtrip soundtrack?