www.parkworld-online.com
Park Hoppin’ In association with Park Hoppin’with Susan Storey S
Summer is synonymous with travel, a
tradition millions of us anticipate every year. The hospitality, attractions, theme park and leisure industries all count on great weather
and eager travelers. The music industry has always loved summer. Summer ballads and anthems become part of summer memories as easily as the vacations themselves. Songs become tied to first dates, blockbuster films and road trip soundtracks. Growing up, many of my favorite songs debuted over the airwaves during the summer months, forever linking them to those moments and places. Theme park rides have been tapping into that tradition by linking popular music with marquee attractions. With the recent opening of Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring The Muppets at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, Disney has added seamlessly blended mainstream music with the ride so that together they become a core memory.
The reimagined indoor coaster now stars The Electric Mayhem, the beloved house band of The Muppets. Similar to the previous Aerosmith-themed version, guests are pulled into a story told by Scooter the Muppet: they must help get the band on time to
its biggest concert ever. Guests are taken along for the fast ride, racing across town in the new Lengthy Immediate Motion Objects, otherwise known as L.I.M.O.s. (See what they did there?) Throughout the ride, Muppet radio takes over, blasting a summer soundtrack that kicks the experience into high gear. Disney invited popular artists to collaborate with The Electric Mayhem on new recordings of several classic hits. Jennifer Hudson, Questlove, Kelly Clarkson and Def Leppard join the zany band, and the songs blast through the coaster’s onboard speakers as it zips and zags along its narrow, winding track. Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster has always been a great ride, and the new soundtrack and storyline updates it beautifully. With so much attention on the all-new Muppet animatronics and hidden Muppet-themed Easter eggs, I don’t think the soundtrack has yet been recognized enough for how much it enhances the overall experience. While many of today’s newest rides and attractions feature original scores, I love when ride designers and attraction creators combine pop-culture hits with new ride experiences. When Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster first opened in 1999, Disney and Aerosmith integrated several of the band’s hits into the overall experience. A few songs featured modified lyrics, such as “Love in a Roller Coaster,” and the tracks helped sell the story that guests were traveling in a limousine with the band. The zippy coaster felt even faster as the music pulsed through the train. It was a unique ride experience, and Disney’s use of Aerosmith and a live concert story line created a generational attraction: parents who grew up with the band easily connected with the songs as they rode with and their thrill-seeking children.
Universal Studios Florida went on to create its own
coaster radio in 2009 with the opening of Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit. An exciting coaster in its own right, Universal further enhanced the experience by letting guests customize their ride and choose their own soundtrack. The ride opened with a playlist of thirty
songs divided into five genres. To paraphrase a favorite TV quote, “Rider picked the music,” and the result was a personal coaster adventure: summer thrills with a custom summer soundtrack. Universal even created a secret song menu that expanded the playbook. The “choose your own adventure” option treated each guest as an individual. Every coaster seat had its own onboard speakers, so riders could pick a favorite without hearing what the person next to them selected. They could choose a new song each time they rode or play a favorite on repeat. I was one of those guests who always stuck with one song: Mötley Crue’s “Kickstart My Heart” did exactly that every time we went over the top hat and went careening down the track. In 2022, with the debut of Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, Walt Disney World wrote the next chapter in its opus of applying recognized music to a new attraction. Classic ’70s and ’80s music shaped the Guardians of the Galaxy movie franchise’s soundtracks, and with the development of the ride, Disney’s Imagineers followed suit. They looked at the time of 8-tracks and cassettes and listened - on repeat - to dozens of former hit songs, carefully weighing each hit’s energy, lyrics, pacing and tempo against the ride’s movement and full journey. They considered 100 hits before ultimately choosing only six. The remaining 94 were not completely tossed out: they make up the background music guests hear as they exit the building.
As someone who has ridden the ride many times, I believe those six songs are the perfect soundtrack. Each sets its own tone, creating six distinct ride experiences. It’s not one ride with six songs. It’s six songs and six rides. Now, with the new Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster, Disney has taken what it did so well with Guardians — reviving classics — and re-recording them with fresh artists. Disney describes the result as “high-energy covers of iconic songs and collaborations.” I agree, but I think it goes further. There’s magic in those medleys. The ride is connecting generations through music. Parents who grew up with “Walking on Sunshine” by Katrina and the Waves are now hearing a fresh version sung by Kelly Clarkson, that’s simultaneously being discovered for the first time by their children. Add The Muppets to the collaborations and the result is playful tracks that have become new earworms for this generation. They are also great car karaoke options that everyone can agree on during the drive home. I’ve read that music can stir up our fondest memories, and what better place to make musical memories and connections than at a theme park? Case in point: the other day, “Conga” by Gloria Estefan came on our car radio. When it ended, my son looked at me and said, “We haven’t been to Epcot yet this summer.” Guardians of the Galaxy, here we come.
SUMMER 2026 5
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