Top Five Driving Songs of All Time

Music and cars have had a long, torrid love affair and considering how much time I spend in my car, I thought I would share with you my completely unscientific and completely opinionated list of the Five Greatest Driving Songs of All Time. 

5. Cars with the Boom - L’Trimm

Debate this decision if you like, but are you really going to stand there and tell me that you don’t like the cars that go boom?

4. The Price of Gas - Bloc Party

Do you want a fun, danceable post punk jam to listen to on your next road trip? And do you also want that song to make you feel guilty every time you stop to fill up your tank? If you love the feeling of schadenfreude then this is the song for you.

3. Race With the Devil - Gene Vincent

When it’s late at night and I find an empty road, nothing makes me feel cooler than putting on “Race With the Devil,” pretending that my hair is thick enough to comb into pompadour, and flying down the street. The Blue Caps clean licks and Gene Vincent’s “uh-huh” lyrics make this the best song about a car chase with the devil out there. And there are a lot.

2. There Is A Light That Never Goes Out - The Smiths

Most driving songs are about putting your foot to the gas, and finding freedom by escaping an old life. But despite its suicidal despair, “There Is A Light…” is probably the truest expression of car love: It’s about a man wishing to be free of inhibition; his greatest joy is riding in the passenger seat next to his object of affection. If you want more you can read my senior thesis entitled “The Automobile and Western Culture: Representations of the Id, Ego, and Superego.”

1. Born to Run - Bruce Springsteen

In the end this was a toss up between “Born to Run,” “Thunder Road,” and, really, Springsteen’s entire oeuvre. It’s the quintessential American song. Filled with lines like “The highways jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive” that are pure adrenaline sparks. The song seems made purely for putting the windows down and screaming along. And don’t even get me started on the ‘hut back buah” grunts before the sax solo. Pure power. If I ever die in a huge, fiery car accident it’s going to be because I needed to play air-sax while driving.