Friday Mix Tape: Jersey Road Trip Edition

While Memorial Day Weekend signifies the unofficial start to summer, this week we are declaring the official start to the summer road trip season, as Phish once again descends upon the seaside town of Atlantic City for a three-night run at Bader Field. With that in mind, we’ve put together a playlist that is made up exclusively of New Jersey born artists who aren’t ashamed to be from the Garden State. So sit back, enjoy and play it loud!!!

We kick things off appropriately with Atlantic City, a jangly piece of instrumental surf-pop from Ridgewood’s own Real Estate. From there we’ve got Beach Party Tonight from one of the original indie-rock bands, Yo La Tengo, who call Hoboken home. We’d be doing you and this mix a great disservice if we didn’t dip into Bon Jovi’s 1988 classic New Jersey, so we kick things into high gear with Homebound Train. Next up, we’ve got Pete Yorn, with Strange Condition from his 2001 debut album Musicforthemorningafter, which arguably may be one of the best titles going. Finally we close things out with two of the Garden State’s most celebrated sons. First up, we’ve got The Boss, with Atlantic City, from his 1982 stripped down acoustic record Nebraska, and then it’s Old Blue Eyes himself – Frank Sintara – with the title track from maybe one of the best break up records of all time, In the Wee Small Hours.