♫ In The Summertime ♫ (Redux)

Posted on by under Bits 'n Pieces, History, music

With summer winding down, the leaves already turning on some of the trees (though I think that’s more from lack of water this summer), and the temps predicted to be below normal for all of next week, I figured I better try to get a few more ‘summer’ songs in.  And lo and behold, this one jumped into my face screaming “Play me, Play me!!!”  And thus … I give you, Mungo Jerry …

This song was written by Ray Dorset, who was the lead singer and guitarist for the group Mungo Jerry.  Now, until I first posted this song a few years ago, I thought Mungo Jerry was a solo artist, the one who turns out to be Dorset.

The band was known as Memphis Leather and The Good Earth before getting a record deal and changing their name to Mungo Jerry (after the character Mungojerrie from the T. S. Eliot book Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats – later the basis for the Broadway play Cats).

Dorset 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. Dorset 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.”

Barry Murray, a producer at Pye Records, was a friend of Ray Dorset’s and signed the group to the label’s more adventurous imprint, Dawn Records, which released In The Summertime as their first single. The song took off, going to #1 in their native UK as well as most EU nations, and making #3 in the U.S. The UK fortunes of the song were aided by the group’s appearance at the Hollywood Music Festival in Staffordshire England on May 23, 1970, shortly after the song was released. Playing on low on a bill with the Grateful Dead, Black Sabbath, Free and Traffic, the song got the attention of the 35,000 or so fans in attendance, giving it a huge lift.

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

23 thoughts on “♫ In The Summertime ♫ (Redux)”

  2. Jill, great choice, once again. If you are still in the mood for summer songs, I did an encore post on a tribute show to Janis Joplin. Maybe you could show Joplin singing Porgy and Bess’ “Summertime” in a future post? Keith

    Liked by 1 person

    • I took today off (mostly) from blogging, so I’m behind, but I’ll definitely check out your post and I really like your idea of Joplin singing Porgy & Bess’ “Summertime”! Thanks, Keith!

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  3. I’ve always disliked this song simply because of two lines
    “If her daddy’s rich take her out for a meal
    If her daddy’s poor just do what you feel    ”
    I cringe every time I hear them. Otherwise it isn’t a bad song.

    Liked by 1 person

    • As I told rawgod earlier, I like or dislike a song based more on the music than the lyrics. For one thing, I cannot hear the lyrics in most songs well enough to understand them, or get them way wrong! I usually don’t even know the lyrics until I research the song for these music posts. And I understand you not liking those two lines, but … I still like the music. I did remove one song, “Hot Child in the City” because the music video was violent and nasty … I do have a line in the sand.

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      • I like songs based on how their sound feels and what they represent, better if both suit me. I don’t have the best hearing – I was diagnosed as having an 80% hearing loss when I was around 7 or 8, and so a lot of lyrics fail to register. When I can make them out, I really, really notice them. I’ve always valued ethics/morality above all else and those two particular lines hit me hard. They may seem like throw away lines to most, and perhaps because they are, I found them more offensive. If I was hearing/seeing the lyrics for the first time now that I’m in my seventies, I think I’d be more forgiving/tolerant, but when it was released I was 20 or perhaps 21 and still finding out where I belonged in the world. The attitude of those lines did not go down well with me then and remain the lines I recall the moment I hear the song play.

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  6. A very spirit-lifting song, despite some of the words (treating rich and poor girls differently!). With the music you couldn’t help but wanna move. But the Ch-Chh sounds, I always though they were just maracas, or shaking a didgeridoo, not mouth sounds.
    Thanks for the summer music, Jill. Up here, though we are supposed to have thundershowers for two days this weekend we are mired under a heat dome with temps in the 30-35° C range. (High 80s to high 90s F!) They’ll be back on Monday. Too hot for these northern latitides and attituges.

    Liked by 1 person

    • I pay more attention to the music than the lyrics. I did zap one summer song I wanted to play, “Hot Child in the City”, because the video was violent and nasty. I notice that Barry also had a problem with the lyrics to this one. Ah well … try as I might, I cannot please all of the people all of the time, right?

      It was a bit cooler here this past week, but I just saw that the next ten days will hover between the 80s and 90s. I sure would love to have your rain, though! We’ve had much less than usual.

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      • Today we got about 1 mm of rain. The clouds passed us by with hardly a drop. The weatherman looks at the clouds and says 90% chance of rain. That leaves 10% no rain. And that what we got, so far.
        Now quit trying to please everyone. We are all different. I like music but words are the kickers.
        Remember songs like Love Is Blue, Grazing in the Grass, Green Onions and musicians like Herb Alpert and Sergio Mendez and such. In the 60s a lot of instrumentals hit the top ten. That was a good thing. If there are no words you cannot screw them up. Anyways, I am not up to date with today’s music, but when is the last time an instrumental was a hit?

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