The Rolling Stone Magazine's Best Summer Songs of All Time

Annotation :

The ultimate invitation to get outside and cut loose, "Dancing In the Street" reinvents the world as a giant summertime block party. Co-written by Marvin Gaye, it has the greatest party-jam lyrics ever written and the drums hit like a gunshot. Martha Reeves sounds like she's doing more than just kick off a party – she sounds like she's starting a revolution.

Annotation :

"There had been a lot of songs about summer, but none about the hardships of summer," co-writer Jerry Capehart, who was Eddie Cochran's manager, said of "Summertime Blues." The 1958 rockabilly raver tapped into suburban teen boredom and angst, blazing a trail toward heavy and metal and punk by making edgy, bound-up energy seem thrilling. Years later, thunderbolt covers by the Who and Blue Cheer would make its trailblazing hard-rock legacy explicit.

Annotation :

"The few minutes waiting for that final school bell to ring are so intense that when it happens, it's almost orgasmic," said Alice Cooper. Released in May 1972, this instantly became the go-to anthem for kids who really really hate school and, no matter how old you are, it can still make you want to throw your papers in the air and run out into the blinding sun of the heavy metal parking lot.

Annotation :

With apologies to the other forty-nine, Brian Wilson's ode to his home state's hotties elevated California girls to mythic status. Wilson wrote the melody the first time he took acid and the swirling piano chords at the opening give the simple teenage fantasy a dream-like grandeur. The lyrics, written by Mike Love, were inspired by Wilson's assertion that "everybody loves girls."

Annotation :

A bubblegum torpedo ride, this 1977 punk rock classic is about hitching your way out of the gritty city on a day trip to the largest public beach in the United States, located in the Ramones' native Queens. "Rockaway Beach" is a vacation getaway open to anyone and everyone, rich or poor, just like the Ramones' all-American rock and roll vision on this song.

Annotation :

Summer 1969 was already under way when Stone handed in this heavenly soul ballad to Epic Records, which was wary of releasing a summer song in August – but it was a smash anyway. Sly and crew croon beautifully about summer days over string-sweetened light funk and while it's hard to imagine a cat like Sly "at a county fair in the country sun," they sure make you want to join them there.

Annotation :

Tons of tunes celebrate the summer, but few note how oppressive and gross it can be: John Sebastian sounds seriously annoyed when he spits "back of my neck getting dirt and gritty." But then the sun goes down and the partying starts – everyone is hooking up on rooftops and twistin' the night away. With a barrage of car horns on the bridge, the record evoked its subject with urban grit and Gershwin-esque grandeur.

Annotation :

With a radiant keyboard melody and swirls of surf guitar, the Go-Go's nailed the feeling of trying to use summer vacation to try to get over a crush. It's one of Belinda Carlisle's most heart-tugging performances and its team-waterskiing video is one of greatest MTV clips of all time. "If you look at our eyes, we're all so drunk," Jane Wiedlin said years later. "We didn't even try to make it look like we were really waterskiing."

Annotation :

Over a funky laidback beat, a young Will Smith does a fantastic Rakim impression over a sample of Kool & the Gang's "Summer Madness" and drops a sweet ode to hanging out and driving around his native Philly: "Honking at the honey in front of you with the light eyes/She turn around to see what you beeping at/It's like the summers a natural aphrodisiac." It's still hip-hop's finest summer celebration.

Annotation :

Bananarama wanted to write a song that keyed into the "darker side" of summer. Defined by a plinking earworm hook and drum-pad beats, this is essentially the British synth-pop answer song to Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer in the City," as if to say, "hey, we have humid summers, too, wot?" And yet, they chose to shoot the video in New York.

Annotation :

"Miserlou" is a Middle Eastern folk tune that surf guitar visionary Dick Dale transformed into the very sound of hanging ten, all rippling reverb and horn punches. It's the greatest surf song of all time and as the soundtrack to the opening credits for Pulp Fiction, it's associated with one of the greatest movies of all time too.

Annotation :

The summer jam of 2013 is a disco inferno full of bright guitar shimmer, robot come-ons, falsetto soul and a beat that keeps you up having good fun until you see the sun. It may say something dire about the American economy that we need to outsource our Top 40 summer fun to a couple French techno dudes, but you'll be too busy getting down to care.

Annotation :

One of the signature soft-rock groups of the early Seventies, Jim Seals and Dash Crofts were childhood buddies from Texas who moved to California and had a huge hit with this sublimely mellow, CSN&Y-style ode to lazy, June-time domesticity. "Summer Breeze" rolled through the jasmine of America's mind in 1972, with an innocent melody played on a toy piano.

Annotation :

Part doo-wop dreamweave, part surf-rock chill session, "Sleepwalk" was a Number One hit for Brooklyn brothers Santo and Johnny Farina in 1959. Its steel guitar melody evoked gorgeous island evenings and blue drinks with cute little umbrellas in them; fittingly, it went Number One the same year Hawaii gained statehood.

Annotation :

Not just a summer BBQ classic but a refreshing summertime drink as well, "Gin & Juice" is G-funk at its warmest and funnest. Snoop rides a slow humid funk groove and a cicada keyboard melody as he raps about a party full of bubonic chronic and a gang of Tanqueray provided by Dr. Dre himself.

Annotation :

"Dancing days are here again as the summer evenings grow," Robert Plant sings on this hormone-crackling celebration of getting down and sippin' booze on long evenings. Zeppelin recorded "Dancing Days" at Mick Jagger's mansion Stargroves; when they were done they were so psyched they went out on the lawn and danced to it – a testament to its searing boogie power.

Annotation :

A utopian vision of a city by the sea where the female to male population ratio is an awesome two to one, "Surf City" topped the charts for two-weeks in July 1963. Written by Brian Wilson and Jan Berry, it promises there's always something goin', a party's always growin' and you're sure to find short-term romantic bliss.

Annotation :

Released in June 1964, "Under the Boardwalk" is one of the greatest teenage symphonies ever recorded, a string-bathed evocation of a secret hook-up down by the sea. Lead singer Johnny Moore – who was taking his first lead vocal with the band after the heroin-related death of Rudy Lewis the day before the session – sings slyly about people walking the boardwalk who have no inkling of the illicit teenage action going on below their feet.

Annotation :

Insistent and laidback like cruising down the Pacific Coast Highway, Henley's 1984 classic ponders his lost youth and innocence over an oddly urgent drum machine, overcast synths and Heartbreaker (and co-writer) Mike Campbell's guitar, which is spacey, menacing and lonely all at once. It's a summer anthem that gets darker the closer you look.

Annotation :

This British bubblegum blues band's 1970 guide to doing what you please is one of oldies radio's most recognizable jams thanks to its bouncy banjo plinking. Known best for the lyric "you've got women, you've got women on your mind," the song also contains the exceptionally sketchy lines "If her daddy rich/ take her out for a meal/if her daddy's poor just do what you feel." Do not take dating advice from Mungo Jerry.

Annotation :

Over one of the Neptune's signature beats, all rubbery head nod and shoulder-shake, Nelly keeps it simple: "It's getting hot in here/so take off all your clothes." Background singer Dani Stevenson keeps her answer to the point. "I am getti'n so hot, I wanna take my clothes off" Perfect for those days when the mercury hits the 90s and clothing becomes optional.

Annotation :

Sam Cooke makes it look easy. A near-definitive version of George Gershwin and DuBose Heyward's Porgy and Bess standard from one of the greatest American voices who ever lived, this stunner was the B-side to his 1957 breakthrough single, "You Send Me." It's been done by everyone from Miles Davis to Nick Drake to Janis Joplin to Morcheeba, but no one brings out the beauty – and irony – in this elegant evocation of Southern living like Cooke.

Annotation :

Soul music's tortured prince goes disco by figuring out how to make heavy funk light on its feet. It is impossible not to move to this 1977 jam, especially because it is about a shy dude afraid of the world until he hits the dancefloor. Perfect for any backyard cookout, it obviously changed Michael Jackson's life.

Annotation :

Wistful like the waning days of August before you have to load the car up and head back to the dorm, Pavement's watershed tune is all melancholic guitar prettiness and vague breakup blues. It could be found on roughly a million undergrad mix tapes during the Clinton administration.

Annotation :

It might not seem like a seasonal tune at first, but this disco classic (which dominated the summer of 1979) is all about getting down on steamy nights "'bout a quarter to ten." (Its B-side was the luxuriant "On A Warm Summer Night".) According to Chic, the sporting life includes clams on the half shell and roller-skating. Who are we to argue with those who can create a groove as recognizable as the national anthem?

Annotation :

A perfect country song about memories of Born In the USA as the "soundtrack to a July Saturday night," Eric Church's 2012 hit is so vivid you can almost smell the bug spray and Budweiser. Hooked to a spare melody and full of unforgettable images ("Discount shades, store bought tan, flip-flops and cut off jeans," he sings, describing his Boss-loving high school girlfriend), it evokes hot summer nights with bittersweet nostalgia.

Annotation :

Like the Ramones, Blondie mixed a tough New York attitude with a love of Sixties bubblegum pop. "Surf's up!" Debbie Harry yells over a "Wipeout" drum beat on this sleek, moody surf-rocker from their 1976 debut, an ode to getting out the gray city and hitting the beach. "Where is my wave," she wonders. Just a subway ride away.

Annotation :

A firecracker ode to unbearable weather, Martha & The Vandellas' second hit single shot up the chart in the summer of 1963, and it can still dial up the temperature any time a lazy oldies radio DJ uses it to follow a nasty weather forecast. Alabama-born Martha Reeves sings about a guy who's hot she gives her a fever over a high-energy R&B groove that was one of the earliest moments of genius for Motown's Holland-Dozier-Holland songwriting team.

Annotation :

Rock and roll was only a few years old when Chubby Checker recorded the original nostalgic party jam – "let's twist again like we did last summer," he sings, looking back from the summer of 1961 on the twist-mad summer of 1960. The chugging beat and Chubby's big, smiling delivery make this the ultimate "twist" song and a timeless dancefloor-filler.

Annotation :

In 1973, LaDonna Andrea Gaines married Austrian actor Helmuth Sommer and repurposed his last name for her own stage name, assuring her inclusion on this list. "Hot Stuff" topped the chart in June 1979, a sex-craving disco anthem with grinding rock guitar courtesy Steely Dan/Doobie Brothers sideman Jeff "Skunk" Baxter.