A couple weekends ago, my love for music brought me to Missouri — the Show Me State. As I followed the Mississippi River 560 miles south from St. Paul to St. Louis and then 560 miles back north again, all within 36 hours, I had a lot of time to reflect on why I travelled over 1,100 miles to see a show.

I have a musical bucket list. On it are artists to see, venues to experience, festivals to attend, and historic places to visit. Naturally, travel is involved in most of these items and in general, the items on bucket lists are usually epic. However, my music bucket list has no rhyme or reason. The artists on it are there because I enjoy their music.

I keep my eye on the artists I want to see before I die, and in July a little Twitter bird alerted me that Beck would start his Wow tour in the Midwest this fall. Done! Tickets bought. Hotel booked.

He stepped onto the Peabody Opera House stage wearing a red shirt, black pants, and black jacket with his signature wide-brimmed fedora, matching the lights and the graphics on the screen behind him. Immediately revving up the crowd with "Devil's Haircut," he carried us through the latter part of his career. Starting with Odelay he weaved in and out of his last eight albums, playing the essential tracks — "Loser," "Girl," "Heart is a Drum" — and topping it off with two songs that will be on his next album, "Dreams" and "Wow."

What I love about Beck is his versatility. He can sing a ballad and then quickly move into a funky hip-hop piece with ease. He brought passion and heart to every song, and some of my favorite parts were when he ditched his guitar and focused on singing. He didn't disappoint me or the crowd or my bucket list.

Hearing "New Pollution," "Que Onda Guero," "Lost Cause," and "Go It Alone" was enough to make the trip worth it, but the coup de grace was the encore. Encores tend to feature an artist's best-known song and everyone in the audience sings along, but Beck's encore was a medley performed while introducing the band. It sent chills down my spine (in a good way) and reaffirmed why I spend time and money to see live music.

Picture this: the crowd is clapping, cheering and chanting, the traditional encore etiquette. Beck rushes back on stage wearing a new, but similar, outfit, changing the reds and blacks for whites as "Strawberry Fields Forever" opens the encore and then moving into "Where It's At." Beck pauses and sits atop an amp. He addresses us saying, "Let's take a moment to get to know each other." Circling the stage, each member of the band takes a solo. They make their way through "Good Times" (Chic), "China Girl" (David Bowie), "Pocket Calculator" (Kraftwerk), and "1999" (Prince), then Beck returns to "Where It's At" and the show ends.

On my way home, I thought about why it's called a "bucket list." Kicking the bucket is a euphemism for dying, so this list contains things that one wants to do before they "kick the bucket." Another list I could make would include people who have already left this earth, so it will only completed after I kick the bucket. Jimi Hendrix, Talking Heads (in their prime), Woodstock, you get the drift.

Here's a snapshot of my musical bucket list, as conventionally defined: artists I've just got to see.

Fleetwood Mac
Pink Floyd
John Mayer
Talking Heads
Foo Fighters
Neko Case
Jack White
The Decemberists
Uncle Tupelo
Led Zeppelin
Green Day
Beyoncé

I also have a bucket list of venues.

Red Rocks (Denver)
Hollywood Bowl (Los Angeles)
The Fillmore (San Francisco)
The Bowery Ballroom (New York)
The Apollo (New York)

And festivals!

Glastonbury
Bonaroo
Cochella
South by Southwest

What's on your musical bucket list?