by Lars Gotrich

As a music fan, you have choices in mobile sound: Do you trick out your car's system for maximum rockage? Or do you spend all that money on records? I've always chosen the latter, which means that listening to music in the car has never been a great experience.

A friend of mine recently asked me help him drive a rental car back from Dulles Airport with the promise of a free meal. No one can pass up a free meal, but as an occasional epic road warrior, the thought of driving a new-ish car was especially enticing. (Don't worry, "Maude," you're still the most reliable station wagon on the road.)

Figuring this car at least had a CD player ("Maude" kicks it old-school and rocks the cassette deck), I grabbed a stack of CDs off my desk. With a beautiful sound system, a band like bedroom new-waver Blank Dogs just didn't cut it. Icy Demons' first album, Fight Back!, fared better with a dizzying piece of fake-jazz. But Yesterday & Today, the latest from Swedish electronic music producer The Field, turned out to be just what I needed.

Hear The Field's "Yesterday & Today," from Yesterday & Today:

What is it about electronic music that makes for such great late-night driving, especially when the vehicle includes a kick-ass sound system?

When car commercials attack, after the jump.

 

I think it can all be traced back to this:

Yeah, I know you remember that commercial, too. Maybe you even bought the Telepopmusik "Breathe" CD single with superfluous remixes and had your own backseat dance parties, followed by a night of pensive head-bobbing. (Seriously, that dude in the driver's seat is too cool for you.) And yet I, too, want to have cross-dressers, a mariachi band and a beautiful woman who becomes my wife and pregnant mother within seconds — I want all of that. Right?

Corporate brainwashing aside, maybe it's the elasticity of a good beat that pushes you to push the pedal just a little harder with each thump thump thump. Around the seven-minute mark of "Yesterday & Today," The Field emerges out of the fog with a subtle yet instantly funky bass line. As I cranked the volume louder in the rental car, the floor rumbled and said to me, "I want to go faster. Don't make me swerve into a ditch." I complied.

Admittedly, my standard driving music is usually of the metal variety, but what else sounds best on your car's system? That means everything from tricked-out sub-woofers to tinny speakers that only work in the front passenger seat.