Segment 7 — Oklahoma City → Amarillo → Tucumcari → Albuquerque   This is the transformation chapter of the whole trip. The moment you leave Oklahoma City heading west, the radio thins out, the sky widens, and the music takes on that unmistakable desert‑radio shimmer — lonely, echoing, cosmic, and slightly strange.

Segment 6 — Joplin → Tulsa → Oklahoma City (Route 66) This is where the trip changes temperature. Missouri’s humid Ozark twilight gives way to the dry, dusty, open‑sky feel of eastern Oklahoma. The radio shifts too — more Red Dirt precursors, more country‑rock, more AM pop with a rural tint, and a growing presence of Western swing and Okie soul. This disc should feel like the moment the Midwest finally gives way to the West.  

I had this idea to create a fictional soundtrack for a road trip across America in 1973 traveling in an AMC Gremlin and creating a CD length playlist for each segment of the journey along the way. The CD would compile songs we find on the radio as we scan the dial as we drive. As always, we would eschew the hits and seek the real nuggets. We have completed half of our journey so let's review our Road Trip.  All 5 Segments of the eastern portion of our trip across the USA in 1973 in our AMC Gremlin can be found below.  Next, we head to the western portion of our trip to LA.   Segment 1 - NYC to Pittsburgh,  Segment 2 - Pittsburgh to Columbus, OH,  Segment 3 - Columbus, OH to Indianapolis, IN Segment 4 - Indianapolis, IN to St. Louis, MO Segment 5 - St. Louis, MO to Joplin, MO

Segment 4 — Indianapolis → Terre Haute → St. Louis (US‑40) This leg is where the trip starts to feel southern‑Midwestern: truck stops, diners, and AM stations that mix country, soul, and early outlaw swagger. The dial turns warmer, twangier, and funkier as we cross Illinois toward the Mississippi.    Segment 5 — St. Louis → Rolla → Springfield → Joplin (Route 66) 70‑minute CD — Ozark Bar‑Band Rock • Country Soul • Truck‑Stop FM • Local Missouri Flavor This leg is where the Midwest gives way to the Ozarks — humid nights, neon motels, and AM/FM stations that mix bar‑band rock, country‑soul, and early outlaw swagger.  

Segment 3 (Columbus → Indianapolis via US‑40) will be a hybrid of Midwest garage/power‑pop regional singles, MOR/soft‑rock AM obscurities, and country‑rock that actually charted on Ohio/Indiana surveys but never broke nationally. This is the most regionally accurate sound of the entire trip so far — the Midwest in ’73 had a very specific AM flavor: bright, melodic, slightly sentimental, and full of local bands who were huge at home and invisible everywhere else. Below is your fully sequenced 70‑minute CD, built to feel like the actual dial between Columbus and Indianapolis in 1973.

t's 1973 we climb into our AMC Gremlin for a cross-country road trip.  We begin in NYC.  We break up the trip into multiple segments and create a 70-minute CD for each segment of songs we would likely hear on the radio as we travel.  Segment 1 NYC to Pittsburgh.   What would we hear and what stations would we tune into.  What route would we use?  I'm leaning toward more backroads. Segment 2: Pittsburgh → Wheeling → Columbus (US‑40) 70‑minute CD — AM‑leaning, regional, and country‑tinged       Segment 2 Pittsburgh to Columbus. Segment 2 is where the dial really changes. Leaving Pittsburgh on US‑30 and dropping onto US‑40 (the National Road) toward Wheeling, you move from steel‑town FM rock into a corridor where AM radio still ruled, and where country, trucker songs, and regional singles were absolutely part of the soundscape. Pittsburgh → Washington, PA AM Top 40 still strong FM album rock rising Regional rock bands (Raspberries, James Ga...