Los Santos is a beautiful and disgusting city, a place where dreams are shattered and men are flamethrowered to the ground with reckless abandon. Though it’s the prime location in the game Grand Theft Auto V, it’s also loosely based on Los Angeles and replete with all the iconic destinations—Santa Monica beach, the Hollywood Hills and the Griffith Observatory. It looks, feels and sounds like LA, if LA were a computer simulation enjoyed by very stoned teens.
Aside from the obvious and easily ignored goal of completing the missions, the main and unarguably best thing to do in the game is to drive the fuck around in a fast car, screaming down the Pacific Coast Highway and blasting the radio—something made all the more impactful when, in reality, you were probably sat comatose and surrounded by junk food in a damp apartment.
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It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say music and driving make the world’s greatest couple. It also wouldn’t be hyperbole to say Los Angeles can be a beautiful-as-hell fever dream. Nor would it be a lie to say Grand Theft Auto V—The Sopranos of the medium—is the best video game ever created. So, just to ramp things up a little more and take the series to 11, the game’s latest update features a new radio station—blonded Los Santos 97.8 FM—from Frank Ocean. All of which means in simple terms: You can now coast the shit out of an LA highway in a fast car while listening to music made by one of this generation’s best artists AKA living in a dream from the comfort of your own living room.
Although Grand Theft Auto V was released four (FOUR???!!!!!) years ago, developers frequently update the game with new features. But fuck all of those: that’s for a gaming website. Here below I’ve created the playlist in full, featuring songs by Ocean and almost every other pick except for Future’s “Codeine Crazy,” Chief Keef’s “Winnin,’” and Jay Z’s ‘Dead President II,” since those aren’t available on Spotify. Lap it all up then cruise on home to listen to this while driving at 120MPH off the top of Mount Chilliad or something.
