Road trip songs occupy a plush seat in the American canon—right underneath the fuzzy dice. They are often harbingers of summer, and “I Left My Wallet In El Segundo” is no exception. This prototypical Tribe Called Quest track from their first album features a playful and engaging narrative from standout MC, Q-Tip. Samples from the Chambers Brothers track, “Funky,” provide a thumping and appropriately frenetic backbeat. Q-Tip’s crew drives all the way from the east coast to Texas, where they stop for enchiladas and a pretty waitress distracts them at just the wrong moment.
Song of the Day: “I Left My Wallet In El Segundo”
Max Gray
Read more of Max Gray at Big City Sasquatch or follow him on Twitter @City_Sasquatch. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Encounters, Mount Hope, Conte, tNY.press, and English Kills Review. He co-hosts the etymology podcast Words For Dinner and is a graduate of the Rutgers-Newark MFA program.