Good on you for installing the CD player!  I'm still shaking my head over the fact that new cars and computers have ditched the format.  Sure, it's a now near-antique format but it is still viable.  Like Yogi said, "if it ain't broke ...".  CD's are still a preferred format for sharing music - especially home-recorded original demos.  You can buy a stack or blanks for less than a single jump drive.  I still rely on my now 12 year-old Macbook for finalizing and burning CDs for sharing my music.  I had to buy an external CD burner for my newer model.  I sure wish the auto and computer industry would at least make these drives an option.

Posted by: @robslob

OK, what are YOUR road discs?

I usually pick a couple of shows, almost always an ABB show and an ARU (or some off-shoot band) show.  Those will typically kill most of the road-trip time.

For some reason, The Who's Tommy has been in my road-trip rotation, like since the mid-1990s.

I also like to have some acoustic music to give the ringing ears a break for awhile.  Neil Young Unplugged, or sometimes the EC Unplugged.  MTV had a Best of Unplugged that I had on disc somewhere that was fun also with the variety.   One of the volumes from "Best of Mountain Stage" series.  That sort of thing.

Lately I have been more into podcasts while commuting for work, and I really haven't had a long road-trip since COVID, so I suspect podcasts will play into future road-trips for me as well.

Posted by: @rusty

Good on you for installing the CD player!  I'm still shaking my head over the fact that new cars and computers have ditched the format.  Sure, it's a now near-antique format but it is still viable.  Like Yogi said, "if it ain't broke ...".  CD's are still a preferred format for sharing music - especially home-recorded original demos.  You can buy a stack or blanks for less than a single jump drive.  I still rely on my now 12 year-old Macbook for finalizing and burning CDs for sharing my music.  I had to buy an external CD burner for my newer model.  I sure wish the auto and computer industry would at least make these drives an option.

OT, I am old school like you Rusty in that I like having a CD player in the car but fewer and fewer car Mfg offer CD players in cars. I had to special order my previous 2017 Jeep Grand Cherokee with a CD player and the dealer had to trade with another dealer 80 miles away to get me one. The sales person was surprised I wanted a CD player as he commented that nobody asks for them anymore and that was in 2017.

Sadly my 2017 GC was totaled in a traffic accident while on a driving lesson with my daughter just before Christmas and I bought a used 2019 GC that had everything I wanted except a CD player so I have a portable to plug into the ACC input when I want to play a CD. I finally bit the bullet and ripped all my favorite CD's to my phone and mostly stream in my car now.

I think I would have to disagree with you that CD's are a preferred way to share music. I used to trade a lot by trading CDR's by snail mail and most of the trade requests I get now people want me to upload the music to a download service so they can go grab it as opposed to mailing physical CDR's. I still prefer trading CDR's but the younger generation of traders don't want the hassle of mailing stuff.

Besides the lack of CD's in cars most consumer audio companies don't even offer CD players anymore and many are phasing our DVD/ Blu-ray players. Also CDR media is no longer being made in Japan with most coming out of Taiwan and the quality is spotty form my experience so sadly I think CDR's are on the way to obsolescence.

Back on topic, I have to drive my youngest daughter to a cross country sleep over camp up in NH the last week in July which is a 2.5 hour drive each way. I am planning on listening to the complete 4.5hour Gov't Mule "Live With A Little Help From Our Friends" Deluxe CD set on the trip as I have never listened to this in one sitting.

@bill_graham Burning your existing collection of CDs (tapes, LPs etc) is very time consuming.  Paying for new down-loads of music you already own seems redundant and non cost-effective.  I always enjoyed grabbing a handful of favorites before heading out on a road trip.  I admit to partial ignorance on exactly how some of the sites used for hosting original music work - or even what they are.  Some require creating and account and jumping through some very minor hoops that some folks just don't want to do.  It is huge fun for me to create "albums" - complete with original artwork etc. and mailing them to my friends.  I know - I should get a bigger life!  😉 

@zambi "Neil Young Unplugged".  Have you heard Live @ The Cellar Door?  A friend of mine gave it to me for XMAS ten years ago.  REALLY great stuff, just Neil in 1970 solo on piano and acoustic guitar.  Really can't imagine a better solo singer/songwriter show............

Posted by: @rusty

Good on you for installing the CD player!  I'm still shaking my head over the fact that new cars and computers have ditched the format.  Sure, it's a now near-antique format but it is still viable.  Like Yogi said, "if it ain't broke ...".  CD's are still a preferred format for sharing music - especially home-recorded original demos.  You can buy a stack or blanks for less than a single jump drive.  I still rely on my now 12 year-old Macbook for finalizing and burning CDs for sharing my music.  I had to buy an external CD burner for my newer model.  I sure wish the auto and computer industry would at least make these drives an option.

I've been driving some since Covid (who really wants to get in a communal cab/car service during a pandemic). I have a 2002 model that I use for the occasional road or shopping trip back before Target came to Manhattan. As I was driving recently, I noticed it has a cassette deck! Wow! When was the last time I used that? A lot of what I have are new bands (from that era) or back-up copies of CDs. I'll have to hunt them down. So, it doesn't have GPS (can use phone), keyless start-up (don't see the point), or guide to backing up (don't do much of that), but it's got 2 audio formats.

Posted by: @rusty

@bill_graham Burning your existing collection of CDs (tapes, LPs etc) is very time consuming.  Paying for new down-loads of music you already own seems redundant and non cost-effective.  I always enjoyed grabbing a handful of favorites before heading out on a road trip.  I admit to partial ignorance on exactly how some of the sites used for hosting original music work - or even what they are.  Some require creating and account and jumping through some very minor hoops that some folks just don't want to do.  It is huge fun for me to create "albums" - complete with original artwork etc. and mailing them to my friends.  I know - I should get a bigger life!  😉 

I understand Rusty but I don't find ripping a CD to a 320K MP3 to my phone to be very time consuming at least for me. Takes maybe 10minutes a disk and less if the track list info is already in the online database. I listen mostly to live music and a fair amount is from silver disc bootlegs I own so I have no need to pay to download music.

I am with you in that I am very oldschool in that I prefer physical media for music and real books to read as opposed to kindle but have to admit I am enjoying having hundreds of album on my phone that I can stream anytime without the clutter of CD's or CDR's in my car which is where i do most of my music listening.

I still do a CDR burn and trade form time to time but most of my recent trades ahve been file sharing on the internet and once I figured out how to do it it is actually pretty easy.

It is hard for us old timers to accept but I think physical media is a dying technology and we will see fewer hardware and media choices to buy and use as time goes on. I still prefer physical media when I can get them but I am slowly adjusting to the download option, like NUGS for Mule and ABB downloads, when there is no other option to get the music I want.

@cyclone88 As a care-taker for my aging aunt, I have possession/ownership of the 2004 Toyota that I bought for her back in ... 2004!  She only ever drove it sparingly - it's practically a brand-new 17 year-old car!  It does have both a cassette deck and a CD player.  I use it around town just because of that!

@bill_graham 10 minutes per disc?  That ain't time-consuming?  😉 

Posted by: @rusty

@bill_graham 10 minutes per disc?  That ain't time-consuming?  😉 

For me spending 10minutes to rip a CD to my phone is worth the effort as I no longer need to clutter my car with physical CD's and I have hundreds of choices at my fingertips now.

I also stream them to my NC earbuds and headphones while doing yard work and on the run. I can take my music  to the beach with me which we do often in the summer and stream it to my two Bose Micro Bluetooth speakers linked in stereo. I can stream to my two bluetooth Bose Revolve+ Bluetooth speaker linked in stereo while sitting on my deck grilling and sipping some wine.

For me the convenience and portability of having so much music at my fingertips more than justifies the small amount of time spent ripping the CD's to MP3's but everyone has different needs and desires so YMMV. 

Don't get me wrong I am still old school and buy physical CD's when I can but now rip them to my phone for the majority of my music listening. Just works for me.

1. Eat A Peach
2. Laid Back
3. Gov't Mule Little Help.
4. Freddie King Texas Cannonball
5. Don Reno and Tony Rice 

Those were mine last out of town driving. But that was in 2018. 

Have big 17 year old Buick LeSabre with CD and cassassete. 

Y'all probably never heard of Don Reno. He played in my hometown for years when I was growing up. 

old school too but becoming less so.

I like buying cds and owning music. It also makes me feel good that the artist is getting his / her share

The downside is that I have cds all over the house and then once a month have to re sort my cd shelves. 

I just got a new car without a cd player (it replaced a 2006, my other car is a 2014) so I bit the bullet and subscribed to Spotify. 

The good part of it is that it has given me a chance to revisit albums I lost years ago or only had cassette copies of (that I taped from friends), try new albums or even albums I always thought about getting but never did. And I've made some pretty good (imo) playlists

back to the OP, that's a good list.

Personally, my road trip list varies with mood / what I'm listening too. 

Posted by: @stormyrider

old school too but becoming less so.

I like buying cds and owning music. It also makes me feel good that the artist is getting his / her share

The downside is that I have cds all over the house and then once a month have to re sort my cd shelves. 

I just got a new car without a cd player (it replaced a 2006, my other car is a 2014) so I bit the bullet and subscribed to Spotify. 

The good part of it is that it has given me a chance to revisit albums I lost years ago or only had cassette copies of (that I taped from friends), try new albums or even albums I always thought about getting but never did. And I've made some pretty good (imo) playlists

 

back to the OP, that's a good list.

Personally, my road trip list varies with mood / what I'm listening too. 

I hear you stormy. When I am not streaming my live shows from my phone I have been listening to the Grateful Dead Channel on Sirius XM radio while running errands in my Jeep.

They stream lots of live cuts from the huge Dead live library and, being a late comer to the band, I am really enjoying discovering their music and seeing what live shows I might want to pick up on CD. I was always a casual fan but it only took me 65 years to finally really get into their music but better late than never!

If I'm going on a long road trip I usually plug my old 160GB iPod Classic into the aux jack on the radio and put it on shuffle. It's like listening to the world's best radio station. You never know what's coming next, but everything is great. I think I could drive across the country many times before it would start to repeat.

Okay, time spent ripping CD's to digital format is time well spent.  No argument, but it'd take me a year to get half of my collection converted.  As far as CD's (or music converted to digital format) go, I have discovered that not all music makes for good road/travel music.

Some of my favorite music contains passages where softer or lower segments get drowned out by the noises created by the automobile or the tires rolling over the pavement.  On more than one occasion, I've cranked the volume up - still couldn't quite hear it - and then nearly drove off the road when a louder song or segment comes immediately after.  A few months ago I had such an ... experience.  I thought my I-Pod had died - kept driving the suddenly a Jimi Hendrix tune jumped out at full volume.  I thought the car engine had locked up or something.  I nearly soiled myself.  Almost wrecked the car, too!

To the original topic - any of the stuff that y'all have mentioned would be just fine.  😉 

@rusty Thank The Lord for clean underwear............

Posted by: @robslob

@rusty Thank The Lord for clean underwear............

Word.  Thought I was gonna have to turn mine inside-out.  Travelin'!  😉 

Southern Blood is one of my favorite Road CD's.

Also, I fell in love with Railroad Earth listening to their The Good Life album driving up I-5 through Oregon on my way up to see the Doobies, Dead, and Allmans at the Gorge May 2009. 

@rusty You mean suddenly you got something like this??

@bill_graham Have you seen this very pristine 1972 footage of the Dead? Ran across it a month or so ago.

Posted by: @robertdee

@bill_graham Have you seen this very pristine 1972 footage of the Dead? Ran across it a month or so ago.

 

Yes thanks rd, That is from the legendary Venetta Springfield Creamery benefit concert and they released the audio and video in a beautiful box set I purchased back in 2013. It is the complete audio on 3CD's and a DVD with the footage you shared.

You can still get it at a reasonable price on Amazon and I highly recommend it as it is a stellar recording and performance. Like I said I am just now getting into the Dead but have read this is supposedly one of the bands best ever performances.

That would be a great Dead show for a long road trip I think

https://www.amazon.com/Sunshine-Daydream-Veneta-3CD-1DVD/dp/B00E34A9FU

Posted by: @rusty

Okay, time spent ripping CD's to digital format is time well spent.  No argument, but it'd take me a year to get half of my collection converted.  As far as CD's (or music converted to digital format) go, I have discovered that not all music makes for good road/travel music.

Some of my favorite music contains passages where softer or lower segments get drowned out by the noises created by the automobile or the tires rolling over the pavement.  On more than one occasion, I've cranked the volume up - still couldn't quite hear it - and then nearly drove off the road when a louder song or segment comes immediately after.  A few months ago I had such an ... experience.  I thought my I-Pod had died - kept driving the suddenly a Jimi Hendrix tune jumped out at full volume.  I thought the car engine had locked up or something.  I nearly soiled myself.  Almost wrecked the car, too!

To the original topic - any of the stuff that y'all have mentioned would be just fine.  😉 

 

Not trying to convince you my listening preference is better than yours as it just works for me due to the fact I listen to a lot on the go. If CD's work for you then that is better for you as everyone has different preferences and needs.

Believe me it took me a long time to finally convert from CD's in the car to digital. The younger engineers who work for me laughed when they found out I still used CD's in my car. But once I bit the bullet and starting ripping to my phone I found I used the car CD player less and less.

I also understand it would take a long time to rip your music to your phone. I have been doing it for years a few CD's at a time so I have over 80 gig and hundreds of albums on my phone now. I have 40+ shows each for the ABB and Gov't Mule alone so have a great selection to stream in my car which is where I do most of my listening these days. At home I listen mostly to vinyl so save the digital for on the go listening.

And  I hear you rusty about road noise killing some CD's playback, especially CD's that have not been compressed a lot there can be softer passages that get drowned out by the road noise. I have found that the Yes 1972 live Progeny CD's are like that as the person who mixed the tapes, Brian Kehew, did not use any compression so they have a large dynamic range and the softer passages get lost in the noise at times.

If you are into Yes here is a great story on how he found the tapes and mixed them for the box set.

I still listen to these shows in the car but they do sound better at home in a quiet environment.

http://yesworld.com/2015/03/yes-progeny-live-from-seventy-two/

@bill_graham HUGE Yes fan!  Hard to believe that a finer recording than Yessongs (other than Live at Filmore East) exists.  😉 

My story also involves a Jeep as Bill Graham mentioned. In 1999 I ordered a Jeep Wrangler. Didn't buy it off the lot. I wanted a few bells and whistles on it. I think was the first year they went back to the round headlights. Anyway, since I ordered it, of course it took longer to arrive. So when I got it I took it to this place to basically replace the existing sound availability they had in it. I had them put in a 6 CD changer in the "trunk", which is the back in front of the tire on the back. They had to drill holes into the Jeep to secure it. They ran this thing to the front where I could control it, move CDs, etc. 

Then I had them put speakers in the roll bar above the driver as they were louder than the standard ones.

I got it just in time before I embarked on my first ABB road trip. I threw a cooler and a pop tent into the back and drove from East Lansing, MI to Chicago. Actually Tinley Park. Almost got arrested for trying to sell an extra ticket. It was one of Derek's first shows with them. I don't remember every CD I put in but I do remember putting First & Second Set in and Fillmore. Slept in my little tent, partied like crazy and got up the next morning to catch them in Indy. Noblesville?

Got to the campground there and it was like I was transported back into the 60s. All of these hippies everywhere. Set up my tent and met some nice kids. We went to the show and it was WAY better then the night before. It seemed like Dickie let Derek "out" if you will. Great setlist. 

We get back to the campground and I was beat. I wake up in the middle of the night and there were people shooting off fireworks. And this campground was right next to fields of corn. I'm thinking they are going to burn the place down. Got up the next morning and drove home to Michigan. 😊 

Anyway, I listen to ABB across three states and had a ball, all by myself.

@lee Great story. I often when to New York City with my dad in the summer growing up and in the 60's and 70's went alone several times. I would feel a bit lonely at times but had cool things planned including seeing bands including my favorite the Allman Brothers. 

So yes one can have a blast solo on a trip if you have a good one planned. 

I've been to Chicago but never to Michigan. But one of my favorite movies was filmed entirely in Michigan using a real judge from Lansing in a key role. 

I use to have this entire show but the cassette broke. It was a decent road trip recording. It was recorded for a live release but for some reason it never came out. 

1974 Blue Sky by Dickey in San Francisco with a fiddle break!!!

Good topic Rob and nice selection on your roadie CD's. I agree with most, I am still a CD guy for the most part ,but as of late I have been using the online streaming app YouTubeMusic. It has nice to dial up an artist and have access to some things that are not available on CD's.

I went car shopping about a month ago and was kinda surprised that no CD was provided, but after thinking about it for a few, yeah, really not that shocking after all. The vehicle I have now reads CD's,CD-R and DVD -R and also has a 30gb hard drive to load music on . I thought I was pretty hip!!

As far as road music goes, what I like to do if I have a vacation coming up I will buy some new music , or music that I have never heard(new to me) and take that along on my trip. Makes it kinda exciting diving into some new material when your driving and having no distractions,kicking back and taking it all in.

Any more I think I listen to more podcasts about music than music itself at times. There are alot of good ones out there, and some not. But I have a nice rotation of ones that keep me pretty busy. Hopefully this year or early next I am going to be launching mine. Just trying to get all of the tech stuff down.

I have two teenage daughters who do not drive yet, and the wife is out of town on business half the week, so I run Dad's taxi service many days. Just local driving, but I spent about an hour in the car each round trip so I get  to listen to some music while driving.

I am still on a Gov't Mule jag and recently downloaded all the live shows that were available from their 1994 first tour from the sugarmegs. The downloads are MP3's, only 128K+ bitrate, and they are one continuous file but they still sound very good all things considered. I have slowly been listening to each show and even though they are basically the same setlist I am still enjoying listening to these early shows as Warren never plays the songs exactly the same way show to show.

Evidently the band used to allow tapers to tap into the soundboard back when they first started touring so many of the MP3's are excellent sounding soundboards. Even the audience recordings are excellent from that era.

If you don't have a phobia about MP3's sugarmegs has thousands of live concerts you can stream and download. Depending on your internet bandwidth it can take less than 10minutes to download a concert to your computer for listening or loading on your phone or ipod for mobile listening.