Yesterday morning when I opened the living room blinds, I noticed something very peculiar in our tiny postage-stamp front yard. On closer inspection, I discovered it was two purple crocuses popping their little heads up out of the ground! The first sign of spring here! Friends in other parts of the country, the world, have been posting pictures of the flowers coming into bloom in their yards, but we had nary a one until yesterday! So, of course that made me start thinking about summer! And thus, this song. I considered Ella Fitzgerald’s Summertime, which I love, but I wanted something just a bit more upbeat, a little faster.
This song was written by Ray Dorset, who was the group’s lead singer and guitarist. He penned the song in 1968 when he was working for Timex in the UK – his band was just getting started and music was more of a hobby at the time. Dorest says that the famous melody just popped into his head one day, and the next day he wrote the lyrics very quickly.
“It’s got no chorus; all it’s got is a melody that goes over and over again with a set of lyrics that conjure up a celebration of life,” he said. “Especially if you’re a young person: it’s a great day, you’ve managed to get a car – preferably with the top off – you’re cruising around, and if you’re a guy you’re picking up girls.”
Released in 1970, it reached #1 in charts around the world, including seven weeks on the UK Singles Chart, two weeks on one of the Canadian charts, and #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in the US. It became one of the best-selling singles of all-time, eventually selling 30 million copies.
In the Summertime
Mungo Jerry
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh
In the summertime when the weather is hot
You can stretch right up and touch the sky
When the weather’s fine
You got women, you got women on your mind
Have a drink, have a drive
Go out and see what you can find
If her daddy’s rich take her out for a meal
If her daddy’s poor just do what you feel
Speed along the lane
Do a turn or return the twenty-five
When the sun goes down
You can make it, make it good and really fine
We’re not bad people
We’re not dirty, we’re not mean
We love everybody but we do as we please
When the weather’s fine
We go fishin’ or go swimmin’ in the sea
We’re always happy
Life’s for livin’ yeah, that’s our philosophy
Sing along with us
Dee dee dee-dee dee
Dah dah dah-dah dah
Yeah we’re hap-happy
Dah dah-dah
Dee-dah-do dee-dah-do dah-do-dah
Dah-do-dah-dah-dah
Dah-dah-dah do-dah-dah
Alright ah
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh
When the winter’s here, yeah it’s party time
Bring your bottle, wear your bright clothes
It’ll soon be summertime
And we’ll sing again
We’ll go drivin’ or maybe we’ll settle down
If she’s rich, if she’s nice
Bring your friends and we’ll all go into town
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh, uh
Chh chh-chh, uh, chh chh-chh
In the summertime when the weather is hot
You can stretch right up and touch the sky
When the weather’s fine
You got women, you got women on your mind
Have a drink, have a drive
Go out and see what you can find
If her daddy’s rich take her out for a meal
If her daddy’s poor just do what you feel
Speed along the lane
Do a turn or return the twenty-five
When the sun goes down
You can make it, make it good and really fine
We’re not bad people
We’re not dirty, we’re not mean
We love everybody but we do as we please
When the weather’s fine
We go fishin’ or go swimmin’ in the sea
We’re always happy
Life’s for livin’ yeah, that’s our philosophy
Sing along with us
Dee dee dee-dee dee
Dah dah dah-dah dah
Yeah we’re hap-happy
Dah dah-dah
Dee-dah-do dee-dah-do dah-do-dah
Dah-do-dah-dah-dah
Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Ray Dorset
Summertime Holiday lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group, Songtrust Ave, BMG Rights Management
Great song!
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😊
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Mungo Jerry! My sister always hated that I loved this song. Idid love this song.
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I’m so glad!!! Several have commented about the propriety of the lyrics, but I never paid any attention … just liked the music!
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You know I think I’ll just keep silent on this one except to say that sexism is terrible but it is a two way road.
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So true. Just enjoy the music … ♫
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I wasn’t liberated yet when this song came out, but I noted the song was rather demeaning to at least half the population. Still, the music was so cheerful I listened but refused to sing along. My friends thought I was crazy.
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Oddly, I never really thought anything of it. I probably never listened closely enough, but just liked the music.
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I liked me some Mongo Jerry. Thanks, Jill
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Glad you liked it! 😊
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or Mungo.
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great song, but I’m not sure the lyrics would be acceptable today for pop radio…
have a drink, have a drive…
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Hmmmm … perhaps you’re right, though some lyrics … when I can understand them … in today’s music aren’t any better.
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there’s no doubt about that…
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Very bouncy, singalong music. Everyone smiles. Point of interest (maybe) the name of the group came from a poem in T.S.Elliott’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.
Cwtch
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Glad you liked it … and did you sing along? Definitely a point of interest … I wondered from whence came the name. Practical cats, eh? Who knew there was such a thing?
Cwtch
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This song seems to have resurfaced recently and I have heard it on online radio a fair bit. The classist/sexist bit detracts a bit for me with its two levels of how to treat women, but it’s a cheery tune overall, very much of its time–
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I think it resurfaces about once a year, as the weather warms. Yeah, it’s not what we would define as PC today … but, since I rarely understand lyrics and only listen for the music, I never really thought about it before.
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I had been listening to tons of blues from the 20s-30s, and hearing the difference in treatment of people: most of the singers were black, and some got bad treatment by the police in songs, and the women were divided by degree of colour by the men (three categories that I heard a lot of, and seemingly degrees of value accorded to each). That got me listening more to the words of things. I have gone off the Rolling Stones pretty completely since many of their songs are just so sexist and racist, which is a little ironic since Keith and most of them freely dated women of colour and Keith at least was not racist in that regard, at least as presented in his very entertaining autobiography.
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The Stones were blues-based, and the blues were based on slavery. The music was raw, and so were the words. Hiding that rawness so people of colour understood, while racists whites would not catch on, was a mainstay of the music. The Stones wanted to uncolourize the blues, and the language of their music was their anti-racist weapon. It sounds harsh to a lot of people, but they went a long way to popularizing old blues singers, as did the music of a lot of the British invasion bands. Without them, we may never have progressed as far towards social justice as we have.
Times were different then, and the music shows it. It is a historical record of the changes we had to go through to get where we are. I am not saying some songs (The Beatles “Run for Your Life,” Tom Jones’ “Delilah,” Joe Cocker’s “Leave Your Hat On,” the Eurhythmics “Sweet Dreams,” or even Mungo Jerry’s “In the Summertime,” although this one is not as harmfully chauvanistic as the others) should ever have been recorded, but they were, and were highly loved by millions. Times have changed, and so have people.
Anyway, music is a major instrument of change. And we should never change that! (Hope this makes sense, lol.)
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Thanks for the thoughful reply. I love the old blues, but not because people like the Stones and Clapton did them or redid them or references them–I love them because the songs themselves are so real in their ways, as are the people singing them. There are a couple of singers from the 20s-30s–Charlie somebody maybe is one–who sound so scary in energy that I would never want to be near them, and some that I can really relate to in so many ways. I understand your point though.
I found Sweet Dreams to be commenting on impulses and desires, some healthy and some not, and found that to be honest social commentary and not harmfully chauvinistic, especially with the androgyny of the performers–I’d like to hear more about your view on that one especially. Then again, I love a lot of Marilyn Manson’s work because it is social commentary too, although Not Pretty at all, because of being based in his personal history of abuse.
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Hi D’lee,
I know little about Marilyn Manson’s work, I listened to very little new music in that era and pretty much since. But as to the Eurhythmics (again I know nothing about them personally), the line “some people want to be abused” I find absolutely unacceptable. Having been abused to the point I believed for awhile that I wanted to be abused so I brought it on myself, I discovered it was my abuser who put that idea in my head. No one, I do not care who, wants to be abused of THEIR OWN FREE WILL. Abuse hurts, and it destroys. Sadists can make masochists think they want it, or authority figures can convince weakened people they want to be abused, but NO! Abuse is not wanted, and I will fight that perverted suggestion to my grave. Stockholm Syndrome is an extreme example of this.
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I understand what you mean and agree that abuse is NEVER acceptable. It doesn’t change the fact that some are conditioned to expect it though–tons of my buddies online and in person are old-fashioned multiple-personality folks/have DID, all with severe abuse histories. While they never deserved it, some were groomed or trained to expect it or to seek it, which is terrible and sad. That is what I meant. One of my best friends, a multiple system, has told me a number of times that ‘abuse is okay if it is necessary’, and every time I say NO IT ISN’T; IT IS NEVER NECESSARY.
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Hmmmm … perhaps there are some advantages to being nearly deaf, for I never realized the Rolling Stones’ songs had sexist or racist lyrics. I’ll have to go check them out now.
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Brown Sugar is a classic about the slave women being exploited even in the chorus–
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Perhaps everyone is reading too much into the lyrics, i’m pretty sure exploitation of minorities and women were not the Stones’ intent. They never behaved like racists or sexists, just raunchy rock ‘n rollers. Like Rawgod said, rock music is based upon the Blues, musical stories that were told by oppressed group of African Americans. It serves to illuminate the plight of fellow citizens during dark times, so (hopefully) we won’t repeat those travesties.
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