I was bought Keith Richards’ autobiography Life (and what a life!) as a Christmas present, and while thumbing through it came across a section on Gram Parsons and his song about E.L.Cord, creator of the Cord automobile – called “The New Soft Shoe”, it was actually more about how Cord was crushed by the might of America’s established motor manufacturers than the car itself. Nevertheless, this got me thinking about the subject of cars, driving, and their use both literally and figuratively in rock and pop songs.
Cars and rock ‘n’ roll. Rock ‘n’ Roll and cars. The two have been intertwined since the dawn of the music. Indeed, it’s argued by some that the very first rock ‘n’ roll record was “Rocket 88” by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats (actually Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm) released in March 1951, and it’s subject was a car – an Oldsmobile Rocket 88; as you can see from the adverts, General Motors made the most of the rocket name! The song was itself based on another song about a car – “Cadillac Boogie”, recorded in 1947 by Jimmy Liggins and featuring a black Cadillac Fleetwood, so you could make a case for saying that without the automobile and in particular, the American automobile, rock ‘n’ roll would never have got off the starting line…
Ever since then, automobiles, driving and the road have been major features of rock, pop and soul music, especially in American music. There’s even been a band called The Cars, who were huge in the ‘70s and ‘80s; one of their most famous songs was called “Drive”, although it didn’t reference any particular make and wasn’t even about driving but was put to devastating use in 1985 at the Live Aid charity concert.
It would of course be impossible to give a comprehensive overview here of the part motoring has played in the history of popular music, so I’m not going to try, but I did think it might be interesting to dip into it a little and conclude with what my favourite car-related song is – you might be surprised – and to ask ViaRETRO readers what theirs might be.
Now, what’s well-known to one person might be as obscure as a blacked-out window in a stretch limo to another, so hopefully you will forgive me if some of the songs I mention are too obvious or on the other hand, too obscure. I should add here that while country music and rap are awash with songs about cars and driving, I’m trying to keep this piece to around 2,000 words, and I don’t know much about either genre anyway…
Even I’m not old enough to remember the early days of rock ‘n’ roll, of Chuck Berry, Little Richard or Elvis Presley, but many 1950’s classics – both musical and mechanical – are still well known today. Berry in particular frequently referred to cars in his songs, such as “Maybelline” in 1955 (featuring both a Cadillac Coupe de Ville and Ford V8) and “No Money Down” (Cadillac again) from later that same year. However, “No Particular Place to Go” (1964) is perhaps his best known “car song”, about the joys – and frustrations – of driving round with his girl by his side, though the automobile in question remains unidentified, a common enough occurrence in popular song.
I first became aware of pop music in the mid 1960’s, growing up when The Beatles and The Rolling Stones changed the world, literally, with help from bands like The Who, The Kinks, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Beach Boys and “The Sound of Young America” – Tamla Motown. Of course, I’m being selective here, but these were part of the soundtrack to my early teenage years.
The Beatles best-known – only? – “car song” is of course “Drive My Car”, which was the lead-off track on their “Rubber Soul” album in 1965, though they don’t tell us what kind of car it is. In fact, it was primarily American artists that recorded the most famous cars and car-related songs – after all, it sounds much cooler to get your kicks on Route 66 in a Ford Mustang than on the M6 in a Ford Prefect. Indeed, the Stones were among many artists who covered “(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66”, and that 1946 song’s travelogue nature makes it a kind of precursor to my favourite driving song – more on that later.
California’s car and surfing culture played a significant part in the repertoire of Beatles and Stones contemporaries The Beach Boys, whether singing about their “Little Deuce Coupe” or about their girl and how “her daddy took the T-Bird away”. Some members of the band themselves drove many of what would now be considered premium classics, including a Porsche 911, Ferrari 275GTB, a Bentley S2 as well as a series of American cars.
Detroit, the home of auto manufacturing in the USA, and known as the Motor City, also lent its nickname to the Motown record label, the name being a portmanteau of Motor Town, yet I can’t think of a Motown song about cars. Also from Detroit, proto-punks and rock revolutionaries the MC5 shortened their name from the Motor City Five, but they were more preoccupied with politics and rebellion than with cars.
It was Washington-based Atlantic Records who in 1966 released one of the most famous of all car songs, “Mustang Sally”, performed by Wilson Pickett, although the song is about Sally rather than the Mustang. Originally written and recorded by Mack Rice the previous year and covered many, many times since, including by my own cover band, Pickett’s version is undoubtedly the best known – though I like to think we made a decent fist of it. It reached a new, younger audience as part of the terrific The Commitments movie in 1991 – if you haven’t seen it, you should.
Other than Chuck Berry, the American artist perhaps most linked to motor cars is Bruce Springsteen. The Boss’s most iconic song is “Born in the USA”, which is serially misunderstood, as is his best-known “car song”, “Pink Cadillac” – it turns out that, much like many other songs apparently about or featuring a car, the Pink Cadillac here is a metaphor for…well, you work it out. Nevertheless, there’s invariably at least one actual pink Cadillac at many of the car shows I go to, even on this side of the pond, but driving and the road also feature in “Born to Run”, “Stolen Car”, “Racing in the Street” and several others in the Springsteen songbook – the (usually unidentified) car as a means of escape from the everyday drudgery of working life.
Cadillacs crop up regularly in popular music – “Cadillac Ranch” is another from Springsteen, then there’s “Slick Black Cadillac” from Quiet Riot and Vince Taylor’s 1959 song “Brand New Cadillac”, later covered by UK punk pioneers, The Clash. It’s far from the only marque to appear in popular song – Neil Young’s “Trans Am” from 1984 is a cautionary political tale based around an ageing Pontiac, contemporary chanteuse Lana del Rey recorded “White Mustang” which is not about the car but it’s owner, and the Kings of Leon eulogised the female owner of a black Camaro in a song of the same name.
What about Prince’s “Little Red Corvette”, I hear you cry? Well, just like “Pink Cadillac”, it’s not about a car at all – the titular Corvette is in fact a girl and the song is more about Prince’s actual obsession, which was obviously sex.
One of the most literal car-songs ever recorded is Janis Joplin’s “Mercedes-Benz”, the blues singer literally pleading with the Lord to provide her with one because her friends all drove Porsches (sound familiar, Claus?). Of course, it got used by Mercedes-Benz in some of their advertising campaigns, and who could blame them?
Will any one of these do, Janis?
Perhaps the most recognisable individual car in rock is ZZ Top’s Eliminator hot rod, a customised 1933 Ford Coupe – not only the name of one of their albums, but the star of several of their videos and practically synonymous with the band during their most successful period, although it didn’t feature in any of their songs as far as I know. It did look pretty cool, though.
Other than a single song by The Beatles, the Brits – while unable to match the romance of the wide-open road, V8’s and soft-tops open to the sun eulogised by their American counterparts – nevertheless managed to invoke cars and driving in many songs. Although never huge outside the UK, one of ska-influenced Madness’s best-loved songs is 1982’s “Driving in my Car”, in which vocalist Suggs sings about enjoying driving despite it being “not quite a Jaguar”; in fact, it turns out to be a humble 1959 Morris Minor van, which he takes up to the mind-boggling speed of 58mph.
This……..isn’t quite one of these…
The Tom Robinson Band recorded a paean to life on the road as a truck driver in “2-4-6-8 Motorway”, Gary Numan sang of how he felt safest locked in his car, and the Bard of Barking Billy Bragg sang about driving along the “A13 Down to the Sea”, but none of these have the feel of wide open spaces and the long highway journeys that American songs about cars and driving do. In fact, they seem somehow rather pessimistic and monochromatic.
Other car-related songs that come to mind include Tracy Chapman singing about getting away from her boring existence in an unidentified “Fast Car”, David Bowie complaining of “Always Crashing in the Same Car”, evoking the frustration of making the same mistake again and again, and Deep Purple recorded one of the all-time great songs about a car and driving in “Highway Star” – three songs that couldn’t be more different, yet all using driving and the imagery of cars to get their point across….
…which neatly brings me to trying to narrow this ramble down to my personal favourite songs about cars and driving.
Well, the aforementioned “Highway Star” slots right in there – not only are the lyrics about the sensation of driving fast but the music pounds along in a way that powerfully suggests driving at speed; the live version on 1972’s “Made in Japan” is particularly good.
Canadian power trio Rush, a band I like a lot, are well known for sci-fi epics such as “2112” and “Caress of Steel”, but it’s the 10-minute “Red Barchetta”, from their 1981 album “Moving Pictures”, that best fits this bill; set in a dystopian future where speed is banned, it’s about a car chase between an old car and two law enforcement vehicles – hopefully not a prophesy. The car that inspired their sadly recently departed drummer and lyricist Neil Peart was none other than a Ferrari 166MM Barchetta.
Shorter, and funkier, is “Low Rider” by War – a huge hit in 1975, this bass-driven song has very few words, but what words there are pay homage to the cult of the Chicano low rider custom scene. It’s a great song, with grit to match the urban cool of the image low-riders like to project.
But my ultimate song about cars and driving – one that makes no reference to engines, power, speed, girls or rebellion, despite being somewhat longer than the average song – has to be “Autobahn” by Kraftwerk. A surprise hit in edited form as a single, it really needs to be heard in all its full-length glory, taking up an entire side of their 1974 album, also entitled “Autobahn”. No make of car is ever mentioned in the sparse, almost perfunctory lyrics (although a fintail Mercedes and a VW Beetle grace the iconic cover, and it sounds like a Beetle being driven off at the start) but the music – created using synthesisers and rhythm machines primitive by today’s standards as well as conventional instruments including guitar and flute, perfectly conveys the initial excitement of closing the door, setting off with a toot of the horn and then settling – using what the band unironically (I think!) called a motorik beat – into the steady rhythm of a long autobahn journey, overtaking and being overtaken, the road rising and falling…three-quarters of the way along, you can even imagine you’ve hit some roadworks before the road clears again…largely electronic yet recreating a very analogue experience, for me, nothing evokes a long car journey more accurately than the 22 minutes and 47 seconds of “Autobahn”. Of course, your mileage may vary…
I can already visualise many of you saying – or thinking – “Wawryk’s lost the plot – Kraftwerk???”. Well, it wouldn’t be the first time my taste in music has been questioned – but what I’d like to know, Dear Reader, is what are your favourite songs related to cars and driving? I’d be particularly interested to hear about songs featuring cars that are not American, British or German…