ABSTRACT
Rock culture contains a strong ideal of mobility. From its very beginnings in the 60s, being on the road has become a symbol of rock musicians. That is, becoming a musician requires practices of mobility, requires “doing the road”, and being on tour, perhaps as much as knowing how to play an instrument or recording songs and albums. This ideal has been perpetuated by representations of rock musicians as nomads, misfits and drifters, who adopt the van as their house, and the asphalt as home. The tours of The Ratazanas emphasised these ideas. The band’s three European tours had little to do with becoming famous, or making money, or pursuing musical careers for life, but rather about the fulfilment of personal and collective identities as musicians. Being on tour was about the experience of the road. About putting on the misfit and nomad mask, transforming oneself into a wandering outsider. The production and reproduction of these identities as such had few or none links with a presumable European identity, despite being an obvious performance of mobility within the Schengen space. For The Ratazanas, touring in Europe or touring in Mars would have had similar meanings. It was not the place that defined their performance, but rather mobility itself.
