The 40 greatest summer songs of all time
From "California Girls" to "Vacation," these tracks make up the ultimate playlist for the 4th of July
Music Features Sandy
What is a summer song? Is it a song about the season itself or is it a song that played in the background during all the good times in the sun? The answer, of course, is that a summer song can be both or it can be any number of other things. They’re songs that hint at long afternoons at the beach, campfires and cookouts, late nights filled with dancing and lazy days in the sun. Some of the songs we now think of as summer perennials were released in other seasons, a seeming disconnect that only underscores how summer songs can come from any time, place or era.
What follows are 40 songs, listed in alphabetical order, that capture the spirit and sound of summer. Some are about the season itself, while others are an inescapable part of summer the year of their release. Each of these tracks has proven over the years to be a vital part of the soundtrack to summer. And, of course, they make for a breezy backdrop to any 4th of July playlist.
This article originally published on May 17, 2023.
98 Comments
Probably too obscure, but one of my favorites is NRBQ’s “Ridin’ in My Car”
I feel like this whole list was created to promote a buddy’s band with “Constructive Summer” — and honestly, now I’ve listened, it’s pretty well deserved.
What I mean to say is, I don’t think there’s such thing as too obscure here.
What I mean to say is, I don’t think there’s such thing as too obscure here.Very well:You know. His other song. That isn’t “Horses”.I got into the The Hold Steady via hearing “Sequestered In Memphis” – the whole small-town, narrative songwriting thing reminded me a helluva lot of Cold Chisel and Ian Walker’s songwriting – there’s not a dud song on the entire Stay Positive album.
Speaking of Chisel, “F-111″ always evokes tearing back home on the Bruxner Highway through Texas and Yetman, going home from uni for the Summer…Mad Max sorta terrain. ‘Course, I could choke this post with Aussie summer rock, but no one wants that.
I guess I get it, but when I saw the topic my first thought was, “I wonder if “Constructive Summer” is on the list? Give the Separation Sunday or Boys and Girls in America albums a listen if you liked “Constructive Summer.”
Having looked into them this morning, I do remember their Game of Thrones contribution.The singer reminds me of both Frank Black and Mike Doughty. The Springsteen comparison is apt, though I’ve never been into Bruce, but I do like what I’ve heard today.
Best Springsteen reference in a Hold Steady song: “Tramps like us and we like them.” I kind of miss Mike Doughty. I downloaded several of his concerts from the Internet Music Archive. His solo songs were really good and he was funny as hell on stage.
I loved Mike Doughty’s cover of “Real Love” by Mary J Blige.
I am a Soul Coughing fan but never knew this existed!
If it was made to promote an unknown band, it would feature a lot more SPR3.
This is a great little gem of a song.
You don’t hear music blasting everywhere in the 21st Century like you did in the last one. To me the last great Summer song that you heard EVERYWHERE has to be the song that OWNED the Summer of ‘99. I refer to Santana’s “Smooth”, which seemed to be on every car radio and convenience store PA system for the entire Summer. In this Century, musical tastes have become as divided as our politics, and you don’t hear much music blaring anywhere. Maybe it has something to do with all of the mass shootings…or maybe it’s the ever-increasing police state. Maybe I’m old, but I couldn’t name a song from the Top 40, and the last time I can remember listening to the radio was years ago. Nowadays, everyone plugs into their own groove, be it from their own archive or from a streaming service. “Popular” never meant “good”, but now I’m not sure that it even means “popular”…
This is brilliant satire.
God, I hope so.
yeah since Rob Thomas always sounds like he’s squeezing out the world’s hardest turd whenever he sings.
Ahem.
Isn’t that more like a “post-Summer” song?
Yeah. But you could say the same about “Suddenly Last Summer.”
Fine:OK, I’m not really weighin’ in on this argument, I just really wanted to post this, because it’s such a gloriously late-nineties music video, and Harriet Wheeler has the voice and vocal control of an absolute angel (listen to her squeeze three pitch shifts into “red” at 2:45…)
Dammit, I still wish they’d get back together. Reading Writing Arithmatic and Static and Silence are pretty much perfect albums.
I know. Harriet and David are still together and making music, raising their kids. They’ve been together since university, which is an incredibly wonderful thing in the music industry and actually kinda sweet. Patrick Hannan has said he’s played drums with them on a few projects “which may never be released”. It’s kind of a fairy tale.
I heard that , but their kids must be in college by now ..get the band back together people!!!
Sunset Grill is clearly the prequel to Boys of Summer
Also the better song IMHO.
Both are incredible at evoking mental images, putting you right there in the moment. But Boys of Summer to me is one of the all-time nostalgia generators. Anyone who’s been around a beach or resort town after the season’s over knows how weird and sad the places seem without all the people, and the song also nails the unrequited summer love sensation.I also just realized this list was published more than a month ago, so I’m probably just talking to myself here.
To me, nothing evokes nostalgia for the 80s like those Sunset Grill synth orchestral hits and synth guitar lines.
You should probably get someone who actually listens to music to do a list like this. Just awful. No Marley? No Sublime? No 311?
Google Stephen Thomas Erlewine.
Listened to music released in the last 30 years. There we go. Doing time not on the list is legitimately discrediting. It is literally the summer song for a whole generation of people.
No sublime and no 311 sounds fucking perfect to me.
Yes, you’re right. LFO is definitely a better summer anthem than Badfish or Santeria. My mistake.
So you are saying you don’t practice Santeria?
I don’t even have a crystal ball…True story: I played in a lot of cover bands to fund my true love (a Replacements/Clash style originals band) and I must have played Santeria a million times. Everytime I played it and I saw that one smelly looking guy in the pancho getting into it I wanted to die.
Probably the least convincing tough guy routine by a singer I can remember.
I don’t know, maybe they’re not on there bc the list is by people who have good taste?
It’s got LFO and Len and post-Pinkerton Weezer and fucking Margaritaville and that awful Lana Del Ray song, so no, that’s clearly not the case. 311 is an easy target for music snobs, but anyone who has a problem with Bob Fucking Marley or doesn’t associate at least 3 or 4 Sublime songs with summertime is an empty husk of a person.
I associate Sublime with 3 or 4 shitty songs, but otherwise….
I know they’re not technically “summer songs”, but I can’t think of summer without also thinking of Rihanna’s “Umbrella” (sans Jay-Z’s phoned-in rap opener) and Phoenix’s “Lisztomania”. They’re both just so catchy, and when they came out, I certainly spent a large amount of my summer listening to these songs in their respective release years.
I also immediately thought about “Umbrella”.
Yes! Panama is on here. Doesn’t get much better than that for the first day of summer.
“Summertime” laid-back ’70s funk grooveCourtesy of Kool & the Gang:
That just made me realize that this also isn’t on the list:
The Cars “Magic” is my favorite Summer song. The 1st line in the song is “Summer”
The Cars are definitely a “summer” band. Same with Cheap Trick.
Panama is of course, fantastic.If there’s room for a second Van Halen tune, I’d go with Beautiful Girls. “I got a drink in my hand, I got my toes in the sand….”**VH actually has a song called Summer Nights – but I don’t think it’s any good.
Avatar checks out.
The drink in hand being a Schmitts Gay, of course!
Summer Nights is fine, it’s a pretty chill low-key VH tune that seems tailor-made for lists like this. It’s probably also only known to major fans of the band so Panama’s a better choice all around. DLR has several from his solo records that would fit in as well. Crazy from the Heat is a good one.
No Janis Joplin?
Or Jackie Jormp-Jomp, with her hit “Bummer Bong”?
I always associate Booker T & the MGs with summertime music, their most well known being Green Onions:
Give me any song by Maze featuring Frankie Beverly, and I know I’m in for a good summer jam.
Love this topic – I’ve got some selections for folks to check out if they’re in this particular groove:“Blueside” – Rooney: “Don’t Steal Our Sun” – The Thrills: “It Must Be Summer” – Fountains of Wayne: “Don’t Forget the Sun” – The Explorers Club: “Cape Town” – The Young Veins:
No love for 2000’s summer banger The Thong Song?
Yeaaaaaaaaaah.Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.I agree
Anyplace we can get a playlist of these songs?
ctrl-f “dirty black summer”
Phrase not found.
This list is useless.
Just reading this headline has got Sublime stuck in my head…
The Boys of Summer, by Don Henley???
Best last day of summer song ever.
“Dear Summer” from Jay-Z and Memphis Bleek… gotta be on there. Maybe more and end of Summer song but it’s a jam!
You missed “California Sun” by the Rivieras.(Though I prefer The Ramones’ version:(come to think of it, the line “where the days are short and the nights are long” makes me suspect this is actually a winter song)
I’m just going to stick to hip-hop for some additions since those are underrepresented. These were ubiquitous as songs in their time (and it’s hard to separate most of them from their videos when I think about summer music):
Probably the greatest day-in-a-life summer video with soundtrack to match:
The lyrical version of that day:
The little “juices” from the bodega; I can still hear this from the cars in NYC:
Hypnotize had a yacht but as much as it pains me to add this is, it’s was one of the all-time undeniably ubiquitous hits that summer:
Simple, killer groove, perfect for summer skiing, apparently:
First pick in the yacht draft:
First pick in the outdoor recreation draft:
Second pick:First pick in the beach/pool draft:Second pick:Third pick:
This still makes me viscerally feel like I am sweating in Bed-Stuy with no AC:
Even more listenable today than Sly’s:
Someone else commented that there was no Marley, so I’ll nominate this:I couldn’t decide on an Outkast song since their entire catalog is basically summer driving music but need this for the Bar-B-Q:
Same for them so I’m going to imagine they’re traveling on summer vacation:I don’t know why I feel like I’ve only ever heard this played from convertibles: No explanation necessary and I don’t even know if this comment will publish:
PE Fight the Power should be number one on this list.
Here’s a load of speculation on the Paul Revere line in the LFO song:I happen to be from the same town the LFO originated in and though the early ‘90s there was a sign for the Revere Copper and Brass Works (founded by Paul Revere) in New Bedford, MA that was a huge and animated (via neon) depiction of Paul Revere galloping on his horse. The sign was worn down and dilapidated (and no longer animated long before the ‘90s) when it was taken down, but it was restored and reinstalled by about 1998, just before Summer Girls was released. So, maybe that’s why Paul Revere was on their mind.
I actually think people are less arbitrarily snobbish about music than they once were. At least in the 90s there were very specific cultural camps signified by music. If you liked Alice In Chains, you automatically distained Whitney Houston. If someone said they liked all kinds of music, you had to do a little check in to make sure that didn’t include country so you knew you could hang out. I mean, it wasn’t actually that concrete, but that was sort of the baseline. I feel like that division isn’t as much of a thing anymore. Maybe I’m naive.
Being able to pick out singles with the press of a button has probably made people more open to having something outside their main genre on the playlist. I still wouldn’t throw on a whole Whitney Houston album but like plenty of her songs.
You need a dose of Kpop in here – Dance the Night Away – Twice
Alcohol Free – Twice
Time Out – Stray Kids
Hot Summer – f(x)
DUMDi DUMDi – (G)I-DLE
“Walking on Sunshine” No. 1? You MONSTER!
The Shawn Mullins song is called “Lullaby” not Rockabye.
It commits the cardinal sin of having a talking bit during the song though.
The whole thing is kind of a talk-sing thing. I am not weighing in on how good or bad the song is, just correcting the title 😛
“Kind of like Nashville with a tan” is one of the cringiest lines ever written, and the delivery doesn’t help.
A list such as this has me praying for a new ice age.
War. “Summer.” End of conversation.
totally.
Beat me to it.
THANK YOU
No “Weather with you” or “The boys of summer”? I’m outta here!
Seriously?
Invalid due to lack of Three 6 Mafia.
Chuck Prophet: “Summertime Thing.” Bam!!
In the UK, Summer has often been all about Europop. Boys (Summertime Love) by Sabrina being an all-time classic of the genre.
Steal My Sunshine is ridiculously catchy, and it blows my mind that it is built off such a tiny sample from More More More.
I have an irrational but fierce hatred of that song. I always though it sounded like a couple of stoned teenagers broke into a recording studio, and not in an endearing way.
The Cruel Summer video is of particular historic interest because the girls were introduced to cocaine for the first time part-way through the shoot, allegedly by some dockworkers, although there were no working docks in that area (DUMBO in Brooklyn) at that time. Once you know that, the variance in “energy” across the video becomes more understandable.
It’s very forgiving of you to insert an “or” into Mungo Jerry’s “Have a drink, have a drive” line. In the UK the song was used in a hard-hitting 90s drink-driving advert.
“Always a bubblegum band decked out in leather, the Ramones emphasized their featherweight origins with “Rockaway Beach,”…”The Ramones. The Bay City Rollers with better clothes? Discuss.
Shouting out the Blue Cheer cover of ‘Summertime Blues’ as my late father would.
Have to go with Sugar Magnolia by the Dead. She can dance a Cajun rhythm
Jump like a Willys in four wheel drive
She’s a summer love in the spring, fall and winter
She can make happy any man alive
So many obvious omissions. Just off the top of my head:
Clearly, this list needs a song from an opera:
The cover of LFO’s “Summer Girls” by Hot Dad is all the world needs.
I was worried that Sunny afternoon wasn’t going to be on that list.Also as someone who likes summer but has allergies..this always was a favourite of mine.
To me a summer song just has to be that song that played all summer. I can think of twoThe summer of 2000, for me, was the summer of DMX’s Party Up. I worked a summer job temping for a bank and I worked in offices off the main bank where my bosses were always gone and the only people I saw were the drive up tellers that were also in the building. They were always blasting music and that song played constantly And the other is 2013, the summer of Get Funky. I was a huge Daft Punk fan all the way back from Discovery and it was awesome that others seems to finally get into the band.
list lacks eels – mr e’s beautiful blues and animal collectives – my girls
No “Sweetheart in the Summer” by Ween so this list is two scoops of bullshit.