Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Songs like Route 66, Kansas City, California Girls, Memphis Tennessee etc., seemed to call to me when I first heard them. They made me want to travel and see places that were far away across the Atlantic ocean from where I lived at the time. Those places, were to me at least, full of mystery and intrigue.

The song that I probably liked the most was Route 66. It conjured up a vision of an unending ribbon of a four lane highway with countless places with strange names that would be fun to visit.

Has anyone else experienced this sort of thing when they listen to a particular song?

Ahhhh...Do You Know The Way To San Jose...nope...Let's Take A Trip Down Whitter Blvd..been there....I'm with ya Brian on Route 66...brings up images of places you want to see..adventure...How about I've Been Everywhere..Johnny Cash?

I went through the original version of I've Been Everywhere. It lists 93 place names, but I've only been to 36 of them. I gotta get out more

This makes for some interesting reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I've_Been_Everywhere

Geoff Mack must be pretty happy with himself.

The Beach Boys' Surfin USA mentions Pacific Palisades, Redondo Beach, & La Jolla.

BTW, Route 66 reminds me of the fantasy of driving from Chicago to LA in a 62 Corvette. In 1996, I took four days to go from Oklahoma City to LA, visiting a number of the spots along what remains of US 66.

Has anyone else experienced this sort of thing when they listen to a particular song?

Yes, but the songs are in Russian, and the places are in Russia, so i guess they won't tell you much. Vologda, Cherepovets, Kharkov, Stary Oskol, St. Petersburg, whatever. There's even a song about a village next to the village i've spent my childhood in.
"California dreaming" and some other songs kinda made me dream about visiting California way back, many years ago, and when i got the chance, i did.

I've a few for ya, Brian:

Palisades Park - Freddy "Boom Boom" Cannon

Palisades Park is an amusement park in NJ. Oddly enough, this tune was written by Chuck Barris of "The Gong Show" fame!

Willin' - Little Feat

Mentions the towns of Tucson, Tucumcari, Tehachapi and Tonapah in the SW USA

San Francisco Nights - The Animals

Pretty self explaintory........

Kokomo - The Beach Boys

Perfect for a winter's day! Mentions Aruba, Jamaica, Bermuda, the Florida Keys ( especially Key Largo ), Bahama Island, Martinique, Monserrat and Montego Bay.

Luckenbach, Texas - Waylon Jennings

This song, along with Jerry Jeff Walker's live LP Viva Terlingua, help put the town of Luckenback on the map when the Outlaw Country movement was gaining popularity in the early to mid 1970s.

I've always thought The Band's song "The Weight" was cool because it mentioned my hometown of Nazareth, PA.

I need to make a correction - Tehachapi is in southern California....would that still be considered the Southwest??


Here's a few more -

The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down - The Band

Mentions the cities of Richmond and Danville, Virginia as well as the state of Tennessee.

Surfin' Safari - The Beach Boys

The beaches of Huntington, Malibu, Rincon, Laguna and Dohini in California, the state of Hawaii and Cerro Azul, Peru and the country of Peru are mentioned.

The Little Old Lady From Pasadena - Jan & Dean

Pasadena, CA and Colorado Blvd. in Pasadena are included in the lyrics.

Tangled Up In Blue - Bob Dylan

Mr. Zimmerman mentions New Orleans and Delacroix, LA and Montague St. in Brooklyn, NY.

Never Been To Spain - Three Dog Night

Lots of places in this one;

Spain (duh), England, Las Vegas, Needles (CA), Oklahoma and Arizona.

Think that I'll stop now.....I have a headache!

Scenes from an Italian Restaurant by Billy Joel strikes a chord for me (no pun intended)!

"Do you remember those days hanging out at the village green?
Engineer boots, leather jackets and tight blue jeans
Drop a dime in the box play a song about New Orleans
Cold beer, hot lights, my sweet romantic teenage nights"

SO MANY REFERENCES to my old stomping grounds.

I grew up on Long Island (Levittown to be exact) right on the border of Hicksville (LOL, Billy Joels' home was actually on my paper route when I was a kid)...and I spent MANY, MANY a night hanging out at the Village Green (it was a small strip of stores) and I, well, nevermind...........but I once did smoke SOMETHING with Billy Joel behind the "Old Curiosity Shop" bar! Ah, youth!

Funny, the memories a song can bring....NOT to mention all the John Denver Songs that TO THIS DAY, inspire me to go to Colorado.....I still haven't made it yet, but ONE OF THESE DAYS.....

Speaking of Billy Joel, there's his song Allentown.

They'll be rockin' in Boston, Pittsburg PA, deep in the heart of Texas, round the San Francisco Bay, all over St Louis, way down in New Orleans all the cats wanna dance with Sweet Little 16..

All the places mentioned in songs offered up so far seem so familiar somehow.

George, That is a great song and it's exactly that sort of lyric that I was thinking about.

Okie From Muskogee - Merle Haggard

I've been through OK but never popped into Muskogee.....don't think that I'd fit in anyway

Cleaned a lot of plates in Memphis, pumped a lot of pain down in New Orleans — oh Lord, stuck in Lodi again...

"Sitting at a bus stop in downtown L.A."