The Sweetest Sound of Summer
Let’s face it. The songs that ice cream trucks play are like torture: They’re repetitive and sound like they were recorded on Mars. But how else can they let you know that Mister Softee is right around the corner?
New York City just passed a new noise ordinance that prohibits ice cream trucks from playing their tunes while stopped in residential areas. The New York Post reports:
“It’s going to be bad for us,” said driver Fatih Erdogan. “Especially in the summer, when people put the air conditioners on, I need something to let the people know I’m here.”
“This job put my daughters through college,” said Doc Guishard, a Brooklyn ice-cream distributor who owns two trucks.
Before they start passing this noise ordinance in other cities, get your own ice cream truck.
Here’s the sheet music for the Mister Softee tune, so you can play it at home as often as you’d like.
July 25th, 2007 at 3:38 pm
It’s funny how a sound (ice cream truck tunes) that was so thrilling when I was little has changed into something I now find so annoying! I don’t know what the worst aspect of the “music” is – the repetition, the actual tune, or the tinny, xylophone sound of it all.
yikes, it makes me want to pull my hair out.
July 25th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
I still get a thrill if I hear an ice cream truck rolling through the neighborhood. We don’t get too many of them in Watertown, though, so perhaps absence makes the heart grow fonder.
July 25th, 2007 at 4:11 pm
Do you know about Michael Hearst, who is trying to reinvent ice-cream truck music? I heard about him on NPR; you can listen to samples and buy his CD here: http://gothamist.com/2007/07/05/michael_hearst.php
July 25th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
No playing of Mr. Softee in New York? What more can they take away from us? Can we hum a few bars? Whistle? or how about screaming: “Get your ice creme. Get your ice cream here. Ice creme!”
Since no one yet has posted the ice creme poem, I will:
I scream.
You scream.
We all scream
For ice creme.
Sorry. I had to do that.
July 25th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
My retirement dreams on wheels! I can’t WAIT to cruise my gated golf-course community in one of THESE.
July 25th, 2007 at 5:45 pm
When I was small in Queens, I was happy to hear Mr. Softee ot the Good Humor bells. I remember when you a Whammy stick for 5 Cents and a popsicle fo 10 cents from the white truck. Sadly, may parents sometimes wouldn’t give me that nickel or dime…
July 25th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
Did they run out of rights to strip us of, so they decided to attack ice cream!
July 26th, 2007 at 1:51 am
Ice cream van-man memories…
“Greensleeves” or “Popeye the Sailorman” being the UK’s most popular ice cream van melodies.
Taking your mums mixing bowl out to the ice cream man to have him fill it from the whippy machine.
“monkeys blood” – that sickly sweet red juice stuff that he squeezed all over your ice cream, or crushed nuts or hundreds & thousands sprinkled all over the top.
A “99″ chocolate flake stuck in the top of yor ice cream for an extra few pence.
The anticipation of sitting on the kerbside with your friends, each clutching a few pennies in their sweaty palms, as you heard the ice cream van tune coming closer and closer to your street.
July 26th, 2007 at 2:23 am
The ice cream vans here all play Greensleeves. Or am i imagining that?
The whirly ice cream seems more watery than it did in my day; does anyone else find that?
July 26th, 2007 at 3:50 am
I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with the ice cream tunes. Of course there is now no chance of hearing it out here in the hinterlands … just fox barks!
July 26th, 2007 at 3:57 am
The day the music died, what a very sad day for New York.
Luckily Mr Whippy is still allowed to play music in England!
July 26th, 2007 at 6:19 am
The music from those trucks is annoying, and the stuff they sell is crap. I didn’t even like their crap when I was a kid. I don’t even like “soft serve.” I have no idea what that substance is, it certainly isn’t ice cream.
Now, I may be in the minority here, but I don’t think the constitution included a “right” to make obnoxious noise in residential neighborhoods, or a “right” to listen to it. It reminds me of people talking about “smokers’ rights.” Do people acquire a set of constitutionally-protected rights when they took up smoking that the rest of us don’t have?
July 26th, 2007 at 7:00 am
ICE CREAM TRUCKS?
Do something about those friggin’ gang-bangerz with their tooth-rattling 5 kilowatt bass speakers! That’s not a car audio system, it’s an assault weapon.
Look for a movie called “Comfort And Joy” about warring ice-cream franchises. It’s a scottish movie from the 80s so it might be kind of obscure…
July 26th, 2007 at 7:11 am
I live in Brooklyn and have to agree that those trucks are awful. When I was a kid outside of Rochester they had bells on the front that they would ring when they came up the street. The trucks where I live in Brooklyn now play “Turkey In the Straw” over and over again, at high volumes. The worst is when they park outside your apartment window for half an hour on a Sunday afternoon.
In certain parts of Brooklyn they play the theme from the Godfather, and I swear have some kind of racket going on — not sure what those guys sell but I don’t that all they sell is ice cream
July 26th, 2007 at 7:17 am
Our guy tends to turn up just brfore supper. lol I just amble down to Taggart’s — an old-fashioned ice cream parlor a few blocks away. They make their own ice cream and have been doing so since 1925! Serious yum!
July 26th, 2007 at 8:05 am
ONE MORE THING THAT DISTINQUISHES PROVIDENCE FROM THE REST OF THE FREE WORLD… WELL, THE WHOLE WORLD…
The ice cream trucks play Christmas Carols in that annoying electronic sound. At first, I didn’t realize it. I just felt a bit of cognitive dissonance every time they drove through my hood. 5 minutes later I realized I was singing in my head: “Dashing through the snow….”. The truck has several Xmas songs in the loop. I’ve checked this out with my friends in other neighborhoods and it seems to be a phenomenon city wide. Weird.
July 26th, 2007 at 9:28 am
Nancy: I did hear about that ice cream truck music thing. Thanks for the link.
Rick: Good idea.
Gary: Cool to hear this British spin on the ice cream truck. Here in the US, we have none of the stuff you mention, except the anticipation.
Liz: See Gary above. No, you weren’t imagining “Greensleeves.” Unless you both are. Now, that would be interesting.
Hi, Seamus.
Vi. You bet!
Gerry: Soft ice cream is definitely in a food group all its own.
Craig: I was trying to remember the name of that film — Comfort and Joy. I was going to mention it in the post but couldn’t come up with the name, so thanks for writing in.
Jay: The Godfather theme. Weird.
Kay: I love small ice cream places. Especially seasonal ones.
Lorrie: Xmas songs?! Providence is so weird.
July 26th, 2007 at 5:27 pm
That’s one big ice cream cone…wish I had one that big right now!
July 26th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Mushy: Ain’t it? Overkill, maybe?
July 26th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
Wow, this would sooo NOT fly here in Jakarta, where not only the ice cream man, but the bread man, the milk man, the meatballs-and-noodles man, the tofu-in-peanut-sauce-man, the satay man, etc., all have their own special music or sound to alert people to their presence. It’s a little noisy food parade going by our door all day long. The bread guy used to wake me up because he’s so loud, but now I’m used to it. Now it just sounds like the fabulous taste tapestry that is Indonesia.
July 26th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
Trish: I had no idea. And we think the ice cream trucks are too much.
July 31st, 2007 at 7:26 am
Hm, do they really make that much money?