The Spring Patio Grooves Mixtape: What I’m Playing Right Now

33⅓ tracks for backyard hangs, pool days, and everything in between.

Apr 03, 2026

It’s an exciting day here at The Wax Museum, as we roll out the seasonal refresh of the beloved PATIO GROOVES playlist. This is where your esteemed curator shares what’s in heavy rotation currently.

What I’ve been jamming to most isn’t on streaming, but over at Nugs, where I keep coming back to Sturgill Simpson’s Red Rocks finale from September 2025. The four hour show, featuring 41 songs, concludes with a mashup of two anti-war anthems, Sturgill’s own “Call to Arms” with Jimi Hendrix’s “Machine Gun.”

“I wrote this song in 2015… might as well wrote it yesterday,” Sturgill says about this modern day “Fortunate Son,” a call to arms against the US war machine that’s sending our “sons and daughters off to die for some oil.” If you’ve never heard it, check out the SNL performance, with The Dap-Kings playing horns. It’s a classic.

Sturgill and Jimi kick off this season’s mix, featuring 33⅓ handpicked tracks across genres, decades, and moods, with 14 from the past year and even a cut from today’s best new release, The Secret to Good Living by Hidden Places.

This one’s built for outdoor hangs. Grill going, cooler stocked, someone asking to change the song three tracks in… consider this your soundtrack for the season.

PATIO GROOVES 🐝 Spring 2026

Stream: Spotify | Apple Music | YouTube Music

Tracklist:

Sturgill Simpson – Call to Arms
Jimi Hendrix – Machine Gun (Live At Filmore East, 1970)
When In Rome – The Promise
Telenova – THE DEEP
High Vis – Mind’s a Lie
Parquet Courts – Borrowed Time
The Dead Bolts – Beau Monde
Gary Davenport & Mannequin – In America There’s Everything
Morgan Nagler – Orange Wine
Alvvays – Hey
Geese – Cowboy Nudes
Ovven – Dishes
Miriam Makeba – Down On the Corner
Black Country, New Road & War Child Records – Strangers
Spirit – Why Can’t I Be Free
Spirit – Nature’s Way
Blind Mr. Jones – Spooky Vibes
she’s green – paper thin
waterbaby – Memory Be a Blade
Snail Mail – Heat Wave
Hiding Places – One Hand
Stuck – Net Negative
Waxahatchee – Never Been Wrong
Tennis – My Emotions Are Blinding
Gia Margaret – Good Friend
Dream, Ivory – Welcome and Goodbye
Toro y Moi – Goes By So Fast
Blood Cultures – Unarchiver
Rostam – Campus (Original Version)
eee gee & Matthew Herbert – I Hear a String Quartet Playing Everywhere I Go (Herbert’s Northern Lights Dub)
Holy Fuck – Elevate
Nation of Language – Inept Apollo (Tom Sharkett Remix)
LCD Soundsystem – You Can’t Hide / Shame on You (Live at Madison Square Garden)
The Rapture – Sail Away

For more PATIO GROOVES, stream the full collection here: Spotify | Apple Music | YouTube Music

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