How Will Pop Music Adapt to Autonomous Cars?

Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society. A brief scan of the lyrical landscape reveals what the car represents in American culture. There's machismo, naturally, as with the sunny bravado as the Beach Boys bop: "We always take my car, 'cause it's never been beat/ And we've never missed yet with the girls we meet." Commitment: "I drove all night to get to you." Luxury and power: "Pull up in the monster, automobile gangsta/ With a bad bitch that came from Sri Lanka/ Yeah, I'm in that Tonka, color of Willy Wonka/ You could be the king, but watch the queen conquer." There's liberation, "Ridin' along in my automobile/ My baby beside me at the wheel," sometimes salted with limitation, "You got a fast car/ Is it fast enough so we can fly away?"