Tour Boston’s Rock and Roll Past & Present – Soundscape Tours

Soundscape Tours offers guided tours of Boston’s rock and roll history led by a local musician. On the walking tour, which starts in the lobby of the Verb Hotel and winds through Fenway and Kenmore Square, guests visit the sites of legendary venues like the Rat, Storyville and the Boston Tea Party, the Velvet Underground’s favorite place to play. The Mighty Mighty Bus Tour starts at Boston Common and travels farther afield.

Proprietor and guide Matt Bowker has been described in the press as carrying a boom box and a selection of LPs to play clips and show visual aids along the way. Tours trace Boston’s role in the careers of artists from B.B. King, Joan Baez and Bob Dylan to New Edition, the Pixies, Tracy Chapman and Aimee Mann. The bus tour visits a record store to dig for vinyl, explores Harvard Square’s folk roots and ends with a pint at an Irish pub.

What to Know

• Yankee Magazine named it a 2026 Best New Cultural Attraction winner.
• Tours also cover pioneering Boston DJs, producers and music educators.
• The bus tour shows where the Pixies, Joan Baez and the Cars lived, recorded and performed.
• It is a Meet Boston partner listed under walking and bus tours.