Pictured above is Landstar-leased owner-operator Keith Sampson, the winner of Overdrive‘s first Trucker Talent Search, held in conjunction with the Great American Trucking Show last year — just one among many songwriters running the roads today and writing music that has at least some connection (beyond their personal involvement in the industry) to trucking.
Overdrive also maintains a SoundCloud profile, the reason you can subscribe to our podcast feed on iTunes — the SoundCloud site is also a great one for emerging songwriters and musicians. Poking around on it a day not so long ago I realized that quite a lot of the artists I’d written about here over the years were represented there in some form, from trucking troubadours Tony Justice, Bill Weaver and Jan McCarter to Noah Collins then of the Cumberland Collective, Erich McMann and recent country sensation Sturgill Simpson.
So, here’s the first installment of “Music to truck by,” if you will, a playlist that brings together some of these artists, and more, for your listening pleasure in a single uninterrupted package. For good measure, Overdrive‘s music-related podcasts are included as well, including audio of last year’s Trucker Talent Search performances and samples of tracks from Tony Justice’s “Apple Pie Moonshine” record.
There’s a strong country tinge to a lot of it, though more folky work is there and likewise some rock ‘n’ roll (one for you, George Parker) — fine music to get you through an hour or two, in the end.
For future playlists, send along your recommendations, such as they may be. If it’s on SoundCloud, whatever the genre, we can include it. Enjoy.
