May 26, 2016 | | by

#TheFridayDozen

For most of the United States, Memorial Day weekend is the (un)official start of the summer. Sure, the calendar hasn’t quite reached the June summer solstice, and quite a few locales have been baking in summer heat for at least a month now. But for that miserable lot of us who can still remember shoveling snow all the way into April, this is the weekend that the beach chairs, grills, and coolers come out of hibernation.

So for today’s #TheFridayDozen, it only made sense to assemble 12 songs about summer. And not songs just about summer, but songs that actually have the word “summer” in their title. There were plenty to pick from and more than a few didn’t quite make my final cut (sorry Bryan Adams), but what’s left is is a pretty solid assortment of classic and not so classic summer songs. We get right down to business with the Chairman of the Board himself crooning about the Summer Wind, and then move on to the Fresh Prince with a song about Summertime that will never sound old to me. The Boss makes an appearance waxing poetic about Girls in their Summer Clothes, and of course we visit the 80’s with a little Bananarama and The Alarm. We get trippy with Lana Del Rey and the Cocteau Twins, go tropical with Bebel Gilberto, and kick back with Chuck Prophet‘s cool AF Summertime Thing. For those of you that have a hazy recollection of the 70’s, Mungo Jerry represents. And for the Budweiser set, we finish off with the infectiously likable Kid Rock tune All Summer Long – a song that manages to rip off both Warren Zevon and Lynyrd Skynyrd (along with an opening riff that I swear is lifted from the Spin Doctors). And yes, if you were cool enough to recognize the title of this playlist, you probably already figured out that we put Drake and Frank Sinatra in the same collection – because we can. And he has a bigger pool than Kanye (Frank probably did too).

So, whatever you’re doing this Memorial Day weekend, whether you’re heading to the beach, the lake or something slightly more in line with it’s true, more solemn and patriotic meaning, we hope this collection adds to your enjoyment. And let us know if we missed anything (no, not Bryan Adams).

Feel free to follow us on Spotify to see what we are listening to around the office.

Care to join the discussion and let us know what you think? Share your thoughts in the comments below: