In honor of the entire staff of What’s Up Smiley going to New York City for the weekend (which thankfully is only 1 person since the BoltBus was sold out), here are my Top 10 Songs for a bus ride to New York. It’s hard to pick just 10 songs that encapsulate the many moods, the many shades, the many sides of a bus ride to the city. I happen to be rather experienced at riding buses to New York. If you count trips from Boston to New York, Middletown to New York, and DC to New York, I’ve easily taken more than 200 round trips to and from the city. Fung Wah (if they had a rewards program, I’d be George Clooney in Up in the Air), Lucky Star (stops at a Chinese fast food buffet somewhere in Connecticut, the smell of which ruins the whole experience for me), Peter Pan/Greyhound (one word: urine), DC2NY (they give you a free bottle of water and take a vote on whether to watch a shitty movie which is quite thoughtful), Megabus (love the upper deck), BoltBus (hipster classy), Apex Bus (don’t do it), New Century Bus (you may end up stranded in a body shop outside Philly), Eastern Bus (don’t think for a minute the Wi-Fi will actually work); you name it, I’ve suffered through it.
These rides are long, construction is constant, and the traffic up and down I-95 can be brutal, so you need a really good playlist. Songs that get you excited about going to visit your friends, eating all your favorite foods, songs that reflect the transcendent calm and reflection of the journey to the big city, nostalgia for past visits, anticipation for the weekend, the fleeting triumph of what’s to come.
Top 10 Songs for a Bus Ride to New York City
1. , LCD Soundsystem
2. , Solomon Burke
3. , Bill Withers
4. , Talking Heads
5. , Neil Young (w/The Band and Joni Mitchell)
6. , Talib Kweli & Hi-Tek (Nina Simone cover)
7. , Bob Dylan
8. , Velvet Underground
9. , Wilco
10. , Kelly McFarling
Please share YOUR Top 10 in the comments below! Imagine that all of the broken reading lights and the annoying person sitting next to you talking on their cell phone were instead giant speakers blasting music just for your listening pleasure. Yes, imagine you could hop on top of the roof of the BoltBus, lay on a lawn chair in the sun, and space out the entire four-and-a-half hours to NYC. What would YOU listen to?
Tags: Daily Smiley, Fung Wah Bus, Kelly McFarling, Lucky Star
Smiley, having taken this trip at least a hundred times, it’s hard to keep it to only ten, but here are some of my favorites for the trip.
Sam Isaac – Bears
The Weight – The Band
Need Somebody – The Subdudes
Keep Yourself Warm – Frightened Rabbit
Daddy’s Gone – Glasvegas
Feeling Good – Nina Simone
Gladys Knight and the Pips – Midnight Train to Georgia
Jackson 5 – Never Can Say Goodbye
Jeff Buckley – Lover You Should’ve Come Over
And because I’m narcissistic and horribly depressing:
Roberta Flack – Jesse
Love it.
Top Ten Bus to New York Songs (no particular order)
1. Walk on the Wild Side – Lou Reed
2. Doorstep – tUnE – yArDs
3. Bang a Gong – T. Rex
4. Mercy, Mercy, Mercy – Cannonball Adderley
5. New York City – They Might Be Giants
6. Looking for a Kiss – New York Dolls
7. Look Down that Lonesome Road – Tim O’Brien
8. Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky (from Now On) – Lee Dorsey
9. I’ll Take You There – The Staples Singers
10. 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy) – Bruce Springsteen
YES Sam, so good!
Well, we obviously share some of the same NYC bus route anthems…we’ve done enough of these trips for a life-time (The Fung Wah Bus? I spent a month there one night!). Here’s my top 10:
Caravan, Van Morrison (w/ the Band)
This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody), Talking Heads (Stop Making Sense)
Harry Hood, Phish (Sugarbush, VT 7-16-94)
Just LIke Heaven, The Cure
The Man in Me, Bob Dylan
Helpless, Neil Young (w/ the Band and Joni Mitchell)
Jah Didn’t Kill Johnny, Sage Francis
Easy Skanking, Bob Marley
Izzo (H.O.V.A), Jay-Z, MTV unplugged
Juicy,, Notorious B.I.G
I converted to Lucky Star long ago dude. They don’t stop at the Chinese buffet anymore, which is a bummer cause I used to pocket their spring rolls everytime. Although there was a time there when I was thinking of converting BACK to Fung Wah because of the rank smell of that very Chinese take-away in those buses. Almost made me lose my lunch a few times, having to run tripping over plastic bags to the nasty-ass bus toilet. Fortunately, now I think they stop at Roy Rogers.
CLASSICS brother, classics. Love you buddy.
1. LCD All My Friends
2. Burke’s Fast Train
3. Wilco’s Jesus, Etc.
4. Sinatra’s I’ve Got You Under My Skin from the Sinatra at the Sands
5. Ellington’s Take the A Train
6. Ellington and Coleman Hawkins’ Solitude
7. Benny Goodman’s One O’Clock Jump from Carnegie Hall 1936
8. Radiohead’s All I Need
9. Talking Heads’ This Must be the Place
10. Curtis Mayfield’s Move On Up
IF I COULD SEE ALL MY FRIENDS TONIGHT…
Love it Smiley.
Here mine. (Hiphop makes me feel tough!)
1. Paul Simon – Only Living Boy in New York
2. Talking Heads – Nothing But Flowers
3. Sinatra – New York, New York
4. Jay-Z/Marvin Gaye – Hello Brooklyn
5. Avett Bros – Famous Flower of Manhattan
6. Gangstarr – Moment of Truth
7. DJ Quik – Killer Dope
8. Color Me Badd – I Wanna Sex You Up
9. Jay-Z – Empire State of Mind
10. LCD – All My Friends. Obvi.
Great list Fanfoni. All My Friends should just essentially play all the time whenever NYC is in question. Like it’s just spinning on repeat always. Only Living Boy *almost* made my list–gem of a song, Jay-Z should have, and Moment of Truth– LOVE it. My Dad was like: “You GOTTA put Sinatra on there!”