I’ve spent the past few days driving across the Canadian prairies. For those of you who have never had the pleasure to make it to this part of the world, the Canadian prairies are kind of like the Hoth system in The Empire Strikes Back, minus the Rogue speeders, the witty banter between Princess Leia and Han Solo, and a quasi-invisible Alex Guiness, all flattened out completely. Driving in the prairies is quite something. You go hours and hours without really getting anywhere (the closest city west of where I’m from is more than six hours away). It’s just snow-covered field after snow-covered field. Occasionally you go over a bridge, or drive through a valley, but those are rarities. In short, as much as I love the humility captured in such a place, and however modestly beautiful the Canadian prairies are, driving across them is pretty damn boring.

Some people get through these long drives with books on tape. Some people prefer talk radio. As I am someone with far too little patience for either of those options, I rely wholly on music to sustain me through these typical 13+ hour-long drives. Music is the element in my travels that keeps me interested and intrigued as I pass through hour after hour of straight and very flat stretches of highway. It is in midst of these drives that I really experience the significance of music in my life. Music captures moments during the trek that would otherwise pass by completely unnoticed and thereby makes the drive much more enjoyable.

The art of picking driving music is complicated. One bad move and the moment you were hoping to capture through these songs has already passed by swiftly. For example, when starting the trip, you need to be extremely careful that what your listening to is going to get you energized and ready for the long hours you will soon spend in very uncomfortable and undersized seating arrangements. I tend to stick with classics for this part of the trip. There is an element of delight inherent in listening to music that you have been listening to for years that is often missing in more recently discovered music. While anything from the catalogues of Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan, or David Bowie are a good start to a trip, it’s Neil Young’s “Walk On” that probably serves this function best. The driving guitar riff and the lyrical content of the song both work to assure you that you’re moving in the right direction.

You’re traveling along well, making good time. All of a sudden you hit uncertain weather. On the Canadian prairies this usually comes in the form of some horrific blizzard in which you feel like you have nothing else to do but throw up your hands and say ‘I give up’! To counteract this, I like to be listening to something that both assures me that I can make it through this, while also creating a space for me to escape this uncertain and strenuous moment. Okkervil River’s “All the Latest Toughs” is such a song. With the upbeat instrumentation, and lyrics like “All the latest toughs, you’ve got to shrug them off” or “we’re dying anyway,” this song allows you to think to yourself, ‘well I can only really see up to the front of my hood, but I’ve made it through worse before.’

After what has seemed like hours of questionable weather, the sun begins to shine and the blizzard fades away. You’ve triumphed over all the crap that Mother Nature has thrown at you. Now it’s time to celebrate. The Russian Futurists’ “Paul Simon” is a good choice for moments like this. With the catchy samples and the big distorted drums, it pushes you to proclaim loudly ‘yes! I made it, now I can rejoice.’ However, the song also reminds you that the trip isn’t over yet, so don’t become too at ease. “Paul Simon” begins with the lines ‘there’s this one word, it’s called comfort, it’s the strangest most dangerous place I could hide.’ The song allows you to let up a bit, as you have made it through some strenuous moments, but still holds you in check, as you still have a ways to go.

Finally, you’re on the home stretch and can start to sense the release you’re going to feel as the trip has come to an end. It’s now dark, and everything seems to be much more calm and relaxed. To bring yourself down from all the joy and anxiety you’ve gone through over the course of the trip, you put on something like The SS Cardiacs “Age of Navigation.” With the slow pulsating beat and the gentle interplay between the bass guitar and the organs, “Age of Navigation” invites you to sit back, lean your head against the window staring up at the stars, sigh and say to yourself ‘it’s almost over.’

All of this is to show how the significance of driving music lays in how gracefully it illustrates music as an activity of the moment. The joy of listening to music has to do with how well it captures a particular moment at a particular time. It is out of this particularity, whether it’s in the car, at home, or in the club, that the true significance of music emerges.

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