Lower Park Drive 3am
When my trusty old 60GB iPod was still operational, I used to have a go-to playlist for long drives on my own. It wasn’t the typical ‘driving music’ playlist one expects for a fun road trip (think ‘On the Road Again’ or ‘Boys of Summer’). No, this was a selection of dark moody tracks selected from my library that kept me company on various work trips out to the middle of nowhere.
After 9 years of faithful service, the iPod finally gave up the ghost, but by this stage, phones had evolved and the likes of Apple, Deezer, and Spotify had launched, effectively replacing the need for a stand-alone iPod.
The playlist lived on. I transferred what I could from the iPod to the phone, then later Deezer, and eventually Spotify, always adding new songs over time.
The whole thing started one morning over a decade ago on the way home from a function at around 3am (It might have been 1am, but 3am sounds way more hardcore). I switched to the playlist while driving through the ghostly empty streets of Houghton and Parktown and felt like I was in a David Lynch film. I couldn’t wait for the next reason to drive at that time in the morning and just listen. There have since been many opportunities to do so and try out new songs. Some trips were even genuinely sad which heightened the whole experience.
From the original list of around 120 songs, these are my 21 favourite 3am tracks. Listen in order, or shuffle them. Sometimes the quieter pieces work better, sometimes the noisy droney pieces…it depends on the mood.
Maybe it’s just me, but they seem to make a 3am drive (or any night drive) that much more interesting. I do a lot of writing and thinking about writing, so this kind of playlist helps my mind wander…
*A notable omission is the Mulholland Drive theme by Angelo Badalamenti. It’s not on any of the services so I couldn’t add it.
Click below for the DEEZER playlist
https://deezer.page.link/6eUHDismBwDyE4nB9
Artwork is AI-generated. Lower Park Drive is the road that runs around the bottom of Zoo Lake in Johannesburg. The idea for the name came from the Sabres of Paradise ‘Haunted Dancehall’ album and a track called ‘Chapel Street Market Market 9am’