I Love This Song: “Highway Song”

[Magic]

I was a Senior in high school when this song came out. It was introduced to me by my best friend Via an 8 track. One Friday night we were going cruising in my 18th birthday present (I’ll show you my present in an few..) and she brought the Strikes 8 Track telling me,”you have got to hear this tape. It’s F—ing fantastic”
I popped Strikes into the deck and my friend cranked it.
O, wow! We cruised all over town with the T-Tops out and played the album over and over. Occasionally repeating tracks, like Highway Song.
In the spring of my senior year, my best friend and another friend drove my car to Sarasota, Florida for spring break. We cruised up and down Siesta Key blasting Highway Song…
I absolutely love this song and the whole album as well.

My 18th Birthday present:

I saw Blackfoot in Jacksonville, NC in 1980 at a huge bar called The Thunderbird. Great Memories!

Strikes (album) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Do you like Highway Song? Tell me your thoughts and opinions..
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[Hydrazoic Acid]

Oh, I love that song. It's absolutely classic southern-rock ballad. I don't know why, but its sad vibes reminds me about "Man in the Wilderness" by Styx (which I love with all my heart either). So, it's great. Blackfoot in their best shape.

 

[CP/M User]

Sorry for the Off-Topic, I've heard of these 8-Track, but I don't think we had them here (Australia). Cassettes on the other hand were everywhere, they were initially invented 1966, though by the time I was born, my Dad had Dozens of them as well as Vinyl.

What I'm not sure about is the earliest cars we had just had Radio's in them (no tape deck), and around 1984 my Dad brought a Car with Cassette Player in it, he replaced that car with another in 1988 which just had a Radio in it, though that wasn't important to him, he then brought another car after his retirement in 1991 which also had a Cassette Player, like the earlier car he car, you had to be careful with it so the tape deck didn't chew on the tape (think the rule was to eject the tape before switching off the car).

Though I understand 8-Tracks were also in Cars, I don't know if they were replaced by Cassettes because of them being Limited in length, is 8-Track a term suggesting the most you'll get from them is 8-tracks? I guess the other part is the 8-tracks are of certain length and you won't find Beethovens 9th Symphony on a Single 8-Track for example?

 

[E-Z]

Yeah 'The Highway Song' by Blackfoot off the Strikes album is a great song and in fact the whole album is a good listen from start to finish although the next album Tomcattin' is my favourite Blackfoot album. The next Blackfoot album after Tomcattin' is Marauder and is another good listen from start to finish but the Siogo album after Marauder at first didn't totally satisfy me although after several listens it started to grow on me!. The lead off track on Siogo kicks off in fine style then the late Ken Hensley's 80s style keyboards come in and you get that 'sinking feeling' BUT after a few listens of the entire album 'it gets better' after a while.

 

[Magic]

Sorry for the Off-Topic, I've heard of these 8-Track, but I don't think we had them here (Australia). Cassettes on the other hand were everywhere, they were initially invented 1966, though by the time I was born, my Dad had Dozens of them as well as Vinyl.

What I'm not sure about is the earliest cars we had just had Radio's in them (no tape deck), and around 1984 my Dad brought a Car with Cassette Player in it, he replaced that car with another in 1988 which just had a Radio in it, though that wasn't important to him, he then brought another car after his retirement in 1991 which also had a Cassette Player, like the earlier car he car, you had to be careful with it so the tape deck didn't chew on the tape (think the rule was to eject the tape before switching off the car).

Though I understand 8-Tracks were also in Cars, I don't know if they were replaced by Cassettes because of them being Limited in length, is 8-Track a term suggesting the most you'll get from them is 8-tracks? I guess the other part is the 8-tracks are of certain length and you won't find Beethovens 9th Symphony on a Single 8-Track for example?

I’m not an 8 Track expert but I think 8 Tracks were more heavily promoted in the US because of the car companies having a vested interest in the players. I have no clue why they were called “8 Tracks” without googling for that answer. I do know you got full albums on an 8 track….it wasn’t limited to 8 songs.
8 track tapes were very bulky in size compared to a Cassette and didn’t seem to last as long as a cassette. Therefore, cassettes quickly replaced the 8 Tracks as a player of choice in the early 1980’s.

 

[CP/M User]

I’m not an 8 Track expert but I think 8 Tracks were more heavily promoted in the US because of the car companies having a vested interest in the players. I have no clue why they were called “8 Tracks” without googling for that answer. I do know you got full albums on an 8 track….it wasn’t limited to 8 songs.
8 track tapes were very bulky in size compared to a Cassette and didn’t seem to last as long as a cassette. Therefore, cassettes quickly replaced the 8 Tracks as a player of choice in the early 1980’s.

I had a bit of a look see. It looks like they provided upto 50 minutes of tape, which would support a lot of vinyl albums from the 50s/60s/70s (unless they were double vinyl albums). Cassettes might of changed all that for having 2 sides, one side could hold upto 60 minutes of music.
It's hard to say which presented the better quality, if an 8 track used an entire width of tape for one of music, then perhaps music was better preserved as opposed to a cassette using one side for the 2 sides of music.
In computers 8 tracks probably would of being a better alternative to load computer software from and less prone to Read Errors, which while it wasn't a frequent thing with cassettes, it would occasionally occur, so it's interesting in that regard that 8 tracks weren't repurposed into computers of the 70s and early 80s.

 

[RedSG]

I just read some tech info on Wiki about the 8 Track Tape. I'm from the 8 Track generation! I remember riding around in cars with friends listening to the tapes. When the song was at the point where it had to change from one of the 4 channels to the next (the song was too long to fit), there would be a long pause. Then, what seemed like forever, there would be a loud CLICK and the song would continue. After a while, you knew when the pause would be. Even years later when hearing one of the songs on the radio, I'll think "it should pause here to change channels". The pause and loud click could be particularly startling if you were half asleep listening to psychedelic music on 8-track!

 

[Romulus]

I love Blackfoot and their 'Highway song' I always regarded as their equivalent to lynyrd skynyrd's 'Free Bird'....

 

[Slipn]

Blackfoot put out some great albums and songs.. I think I have 5 albums by them?? If your into southern rock, there are a few bands to listen too..

Magic remember this song??