Our songs are sing-along songs

A hallmark of any Big Event that I am a part of is a music mix, known to children of the 80s and fans of High Fidelity as the mix tape.

I don't remember making my first mix tape, but I do remember being amazed at the dual cassette deck technology. I also was one of many teenage boys who thought all it took to seduce a woman was a mix tape.

My college roommate kickstarted my personal tradition of having a soundtrack to accompany major and not-so-major events in my life. Jason was great at creating a mix CD to match every road trip, party, finals week, and break up we went through. I can't hear "The Freshman" or "Secret Garden" without thinking of freshman year, "One Week" without thinking of Heath, or "Work It" without thinking of partying in Columbus with Steve-O.

I have extended the tradition to my horse racing travels with "Mr. Brightside" being ubiquitous to the 2005 Preakness Stakes.

This year's mix, which hopefully will provide some entertainment while sitting in L.A. traffic, is mostly a collection of current pop and songs about California. As Rob teaches us at the end of High Fidelity, a good mix tape isn't about what you like, but what about all who will hear it like. My typical formula is to start with a couple current pop songs I know my audience likes and then branch out from there to similar styles. This mix starts upbeat to match our excitement of getting in the car and being in L.A. for Breeders' Cup then turns dark about the time we hit our first traffic jam and brightens up again as we cruise into Arcadia.

1. "Run This Town" by Jay-Z featuring Rhianna and Kanye West... This seemed like a good way to start. Any Big Event in racing worth its salt has a social aspect to it, and "Run This Town" makes me thinking of cruising in a limo with friends heading to some trendy party behind a velvet rope. In real life, I'm more likely to wash a limo than ride in one, would be flying solo, and would look more like Homer Simpson outside a meeting of the sacred No Homers than a jetsetter, but anyone can be Paris Hilton while listening to this song.

Favorite lyric: "I'm addicted to the thrill, it's a dangerous love affair; can't be scared when it goes down; got a problem, tell me now." I love the message of being in something 100% especially since I have $4,000 of mostly other people's money to bet in my Breeders' Cup wagering syndicate. Also, Rhianna actually having the narrative of the song is brilliant songwriting.

2. "I Gotta Feeling" by the Black-Eyed Peas... Yeah, I know this is a cliche pick, but I think this is a great pop song despite protests from both Frank and Jim Rome, and I know most of the people who will be in my car like it.

Favorite lyric: "Fill up my cup." The reason the racing parties are so popular is because they have an open bar.

3. "California Girls" by the Magnetic Fields... I'm really anxious to hear the reaction from my group when it hears this song. It blew me away when I first heard it (thanks to some recommendations on Twitter, and I knew instantly that this would be on the #BC09 mix.

Favorite lyric: "They ain't broke so they put on airs." It's maddening how many people in this world cry poor and have all the newest gadgets, etc.

4. "I Hate L.A." by Bowling For Soup... It's not the best cut on their new disc, Sorry for Partyin', but it is a catchy tune, gives props to Ohio, and mentions In N Out Burger.

Favorite lyric: "Snooty fucks, pollution fills the air (I want to smoke outside!)." New Yorkers have a reputation for thinking they're better than everyone, but the attitude is worse in L.A.

5. "Cheated Hearts" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs... This is a transition song. I thought the beat and voice keeps it close enough to pop that it makes sense to follow the opening quartet, but it's definitely a bridge to the darker part of the disc.

Favorite lyric: "Sometimes I think that I'm bigger than the sound." We're all a part of something bigger and to think otherwise is a tragic flaw worthy of many Shakespearean dramas.

6. "Isabella County" by Great Lakes Myth Society... This is one of my favorite drinking songs in the sense that it's easy to imagine a band playing this on a wooden plank in a dank bar while the locals sing along. Plus, former Thoroughbred Times intern Joe Nevills is from this area.

Favorite lyric: "In a town where the drinkers are plowed like the roads in a heap around their breakfast in yesterday's clothes." One of the best lyrics about a hangover ever put to music.

7. "California" by Lunavelis... Another sort of regional choice in that A) it mentions California and B) Lunavelis (aka Chris Feran) is from Cleveland, so the localities of two of my favorite Turf writers (Nevills and myself, HA!) are represented here. This song is kind of sad, but I like the yearning theme since in racing we're all chasing a dream

Favorite lyric: "You'd rather drive; I'd rather die." As a fan of Jim Steinman from way back in the day, I'm all about the melodrama in music, and this lyric is way over the top.

8. "Life is a Movie or Maybe" by Okkervil River... Another bridge song here as we move away from the dark and back into the light. I love the yearning in Will Sheff's voice here, and the lyrics deliver on the theme of optimism reigning supreme even among adversity.

Favorite lyric: "It's just a life story, so there's no climax." We're all guilty sometimes of letting life pass us by because we think we're waiting for something bigger, but life is the big thing. We're living it every second.

9. "Here's Lookin' At You Kid" by Gaslight Anthem... In hindsight, I probably could have swapped eight for nine or moved this more toward the end since this song sort of has a looking back on life vibe a la Tom Waits's "Martha." This song speaks to me as a journalist because of it's biographical nature.

Favorite lyric: "I used to wait in diners a million nights without her, praying that she won't cancel again tonight, and the waiter served my coffee with a consolation sigh." The vivid imagery delivered here is haunting.

10. "No Hueblo Ingles" by Bowling For Soup... This is just a fun song, and with all the stuff going on this week, I'm sure I'd rather just ignore a problem than confront it.

Favorite lyric: "A guy walks up says, 'Doma esta peppe;' he no hueblo ingles." I think a major tenet of any successful pop act is not to take yourself too seriously, and Bowling For Soup always has fun.

11. "Balloon Flight" by Grammar Club... I used to think this song was about condoms, but now I'm not so sure. Regardless, it was a must include post balloon boy.

Favorite lyric: "I'll make depression and sadness disappear like it's a magic trick." Someone needs to sing that lyric to the guy alone in the diner stood up for the millionth time.

12. "Dani California" by Red Hot Chili Peppers... Isn't there a law about putting the Red Chili Peppers on any compilation of music involving California? Well, there should be. We want chilly willy!

Favorite lyric: "Looking down the barrel of a hot little .45—just another way to survive." I like the sort of morality play this song presents.

13. "Constructive Summer" by The Hold Steady... This was a selfish pick because no one I know likes Craig Finn's voice, but Stay Positive is one of my favorite albums of all time and this song while not always my favorite on that album is the one that most reminds me of racing for whatever reason. I'd love to shoot a video of this with scenes from the Derby. Plus, I built a deck this summer.

Favorite lyric: "Let this by my annual reminder that we can all be something bigger." Despite the message I take from "Life is a Movie or Maybe," I still think we are capable of something better. You just can't sit around waiting for it.

14. "Dogs Days" by Florence and the Machine... The absolute breakout artist of 2009 for me, and the lyric "the horses are coming so you better run" is enough to merit inclusion here.

Favorite lyric: "Happiness hit her like a bullet in the back." I love epiphany lyrics in music, and this is a great simile for that sort of "ah ha!" moment.

15. "Maps" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs... This song always reminded me of traveling, so I typically include it if I can make it work with the other tracks on the compilation and since Florence Welch and Karen O have two of my absolute favorite female voices in music right now, I thought it was a good one-two, though I'm wondering if I should have put "Cheated Hearts" here and "Maps" earlier.

Favorite lyric: "They don't love you like I love you." It's such a simple statement, and I love the urgency with which the fact is presented.

16. "Slow Suicide" by JamisonParker... I had this song on a Derby mix, and I found that it matched driving to one of the parties perfectly, so I thought it merited inclusion here since I planned the Turf writers dinner and will look forward to cutting loose the following night. Also, the intros to this and "Maps" are similar.

Favorite lyric: "

17. "Heart Tits" by Grammar Club... This song reminds me of a couple I know, so I stuck it on here because I imagine it could apply to a lot of guys trying to rep the LA lifestyle

Favorite lyric: "And your bra must have been my size." I'll stop short of calling this a "deep" song because it's not by any means, but I do enjoy the brutal honesty with which Grammar Club describes how stupid it is for guys to base entire relationships on breasts and even though they do.

18. "Ohio (Come Back to Texas" by Bowling for Soup... This song always reminds me of the Breeders' Cup because of the quasi hard sell Sam Houston Race Park tried to put on BC Ltd. to have the BC return to Texas (it was at Lone Star in 2004). Why SHRP did not use this song in its pitch or get Weird Al to write a parody of it is beyond me.

Favorite lyric: Not a lyric per se, but I like the "breakdown" of who wants you back. This song needs to be coupled with Lyle Lovett's "That's Right (You're Not From Texas)".

19. "I Hate California" by Jonathan Coulton... Again, this wasn't so much about putting my favorite Coulton cut on here so much as it was how do you not put this on the disc given the other songs on here? It's fairly pedestrian but fits the theme.

Favorite lyric: Meh