The best summer songs, according to FT readers
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Earlier this summer, a host of FT journalists, including Martin Wolf, Jemima Kelly, Stephen Bush and Janine Gibson, wrote about the tracks that evoke festivals, first loves, sunshine and cricket. In the comment section, you, our loyal readers, shared your own best-loved summer tunes. Here is a selection of the best:
Costa Rica by Ex-Otago
For me it’s Ex-Otago’s “Costa Rica”, a track overheard in a Barcelona café on a family holiday in my early teens. Not the happiest or my favourite holiday, but the song will always symbolise my youthful lens on the world that summer, and how much I grew up in the years after it.
—AirborneFuturism
Wasn’t Born to Follow by The Byrds
My summer choice would be The Byrds’ “Wasn’t Born to Follow” from Easy Rider in 1969. Great combination of freedom, travel and the knowledge of how it would end for Captain America is reminiscent of where we are today.
—LK Hyman
Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift
It has to be “Cruel Summer” by Taylor Swift. The opening beats immediately take me back to the Eras tour, and shout-singing the bridge with thousands of people covered in glitter will forever be my ultimate happy place. It was the ultimate summer experience.
—Bels TD
Sexual Healing by Marvin Gaye
My addition is “Sexual Healing” by Marvin Gaye. Memories of trying to revise with this blasting from a neighbour’s open window. A great distraction one summer in SE London early ’80s.
—E Hale
Crepuscolo sul mare by Piero Umiliani
Crepuscolo sul mare by Piero Umiliani, so evocative, instantly bringing me back to those hot, lazy days in Puglia, filled with swimming in the Ionian Sea, wonderful food, rosato and not much more . . .
—Sunny Days
Plein soleil by Gilbert Bécaud
The ultimate summer song is of course “Plein soleil” by Gilbert Bécaud. Play it and you will see that it requires no explanation.
—Lord Runcible of Spoonshire
Tango in the Night by Fleetwood Mac
“Tango in the Night”, by Fleetwood Mac, brings back fond memories of my first trip to the UK, in 1987. The album was probably topping the charts at the time, which is why I gave it a try. I listen to the album regularly and, when I do, I dream I am strolling on the Downs, on my way to the Cambridge Arms in Redland. Comme j’aimerais boire une pinte de bitter en ce moment!
—Caezar
Axis: Bold as Love by The Jimi Hendrix Experience
I hate summer, always have, the bleak heat and pounding sun of the south-west US. So I used to hide out in the basement of the family home where it was cool and listen to records. One summer my latest acquisition was Hendrix’s Axis: Bold as Love. For some reason, summer always takes me back to that album.
— jodefaw
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