March 15, 2017
Chris Sikich/for PhillyVoice
Mary Lattimore plays the Foundry at Fillmore Philly on July 29.
These things, steady as they come, don't write themselves. The refrain is that Wawa is the greatest, by at least a mile, and who do you know out there writing songs for Sheetz, which is supposedly Pennsylvania's favorite convenience store?
Philadelphia-based harpist Mary Lattimore is inspired by the Wawas at the Jersey Shore, whose home state rightly gave Wawa its due in the GasBuddy poll linked above. Lattimore recently told CLRVYNT that "Wawa by the Ocean" is dedicated, to be exact, to Wawa #700 in Ship Bottom.
The store is so close to the entrance to the beach, so you change into your swimsuit, grab a veggie hoagie, a giant water [and] a container of pineapple with a fork, and you have your own little mini-vacation all day before driving back home. Twelve summers of solo trips to Ship Bottom and it hasn't really changed. I'll always visit it in my dreams.
Lattimore, who spoke to PhillyVoice last year about collaborating with everyone from Kurt Vile and Sonic Youth to Jeff Zeigler, included the new tune on her upcoming "Collected Pieces," a compilation she describes as "a time capsule of stuff I recorded in my dining room in Fishtown over the years."
With traces of "I Love the Mountains," the "boom-de-a-da song" your third-grade music teacher made you sing and mean, damn it, this is as lovely and pleasant as a Wawa song can be.
"Collected Pieces" is due out April 14 on indie label Ghostly International.
