West Michigan’s Picks For a Rock Playlist To Celebrate 420

Here are West Michigan's picks for a 420 playlist to help you enjoy the holiday.

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420 - The Unwritten Holiday

April 20th has long been an underground holiday but now that recreational marijuana is legal in Michigan and other states in the country the holiday has become more mainstream.

It is hard to verify the exact date of when marijuana users began using the hour at 4:20 p.m. or the date 4/20 to get high but it looks like 1971 was the year.

It dates back to some self-proclaimed hippies in San Rafael, California who nicknamed their group "The Waldos" (not sure if this has anything to do with "Where's Waldo" but it's a theory). The Waldos used 4:20 in the afternoon as a time to meet and smoke some bud.

West Michigan Pick's a 420 Playlist

I reached out on Facebook yesterday to ask the people of West Michigan to pick out songs for a 420 playlist and this is what people came up with:

As you can see from the posts above, West Michigan is very passionate about its 420 playlists. As you will see, artists like Sublime, Afroman, Hinder, Tom Petty, Clutch, and Black Sabbath will come up often.

Toby Keith and Rick James come up a few times on the list and Cypress Hill was another popular artist to help celebrate 420.

Weezer and Theory of a Deadman pop up a few times on the list but I was surprised to see Amy Winehouse, but again, it makes sense. I was glad to see that some remember Cheech and Chong because those two guys were the first two to really bring marijuana into the mainstream.

Down's "Bury Me In Smoke" made a few appearances and I will be sure to add that one to my playlist next year.

Seeing Jim Stafford a couple of times definitely put a smile on my face. Do you remember his old TV show The Jim Stafford Show? The Wildwood Weed song was probably not a song that made the show. Lol.

The 420 Playlists 2023

Here is the list I went with based on West Michigan's suggestions:

• Hinder - Get Stoned
• Black Sabbath - Sweet Leaf (live) - Next year I will use the studio version.
• Tool - The Pot
• Black Stone Cherry - Me and Mary Jane
• Sublime - Smoke 2 Joints
• Tom Petty - You Don't Know How It Feels
• Weezer - Hash Pipe
• Clutch - Spacegrass
• Jimi Hendrix - Purple Haze
• Pop Evil - Ways to Get High
• Wayland - Get a Little

Both Afroman's "Because I Got High" and Cypress Hills' "Hits From the Bong" get honorable mentions and will hopefully make the 2024 playlist.

All in all, thanks West Michigan for your suggestions. Happy 420.