Top travel destinations for rock’n’roll enthusiasts (part 3)

You thought we were done with our roundup of rock’n’roll destinations? Well we aren’t not by a long shop, we don’t give up on rock’n’roll, so here are some other top travel destinations for rock’n’roll enthusiasts.

Capitol Record Tower – Hollywood

Built back in 1956 to look like a stack of vinyl records – how the world has changed in the meanwhile – the 13-storey Capital Records Tower is still there, an icon of music industry’s history as well as a survivor of it. A few interesting features about it: it’s top blinks ‘Hollywood’ in Morse code – yet another sign of times long past – John Lennon’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is outside as well as a mural of jazz artists such as Nat ‘King’ Cole.

Mason City & Clear Lake, Iowa – The Day Music Died

This is a pilgrimage spot for fans of Buddy Holly, the Big Bopper and Richie Valens. This is where they made their final appearance, at the Surf Ballroom in Mason City which has not changed very much in the half-century since.

The free museum here exhibits artifacts such as the phone booth Holly made his last call from and then you can go see the memorials to Holly near the crash site at Clear Lake. This tragedy and massive loss to music history has never left rock consciousness because of Don McLean’s song ‘American Pie’.

Haight-Ashbury – San Francisco

For those of you interested in the hippie movement, or rather the music from said time span, you surely have to visit the blocks around Ashbury St. in San Francisco’s Upper Haight. This is where the hippie movement centered around and it’s where bands like Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin lived.

Hippies from all around the country poured in here for the music, the mind-altering substances and the atmosphere in general. This place and time was also immortalized in song in the song ‘San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers In Your Hair’