Summer Music Memories
Clockwise from upper left: Cat Stevens, cover for Violent Femmes, cover for Maggot Brain, cover for Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited.
Clockwise from upper left: Cat Stevens, cover for Violent Femmes, cover for Maggot Brain, cover for Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited.
To a certain extent, we all share the same music every summer. Once the three or four hottest club bangers of the season find their way into rotation, they're all but inescapable — blasting from every trunk speaker and boom box, popping up in every TV commercial and movie trailer. But there are also songs and albums that, regardless of when they were released, become forever linked in our minds with a particular summer and the people with whom we spent them.
On this week's episode of All Songs Considered, Bob Boilen and Robin Hilton share the songs that made their summers in Queens and Kansas, respectively — and listeners chime in with their own memories. Included are American classics from Bob Dylan and Neil Young, some virtuosic noodling from Funkadelic and Rush, and the inevitable, all-time jam that is Violent Femmes' "Blister in the Sun."
Summer Music Memories
Like a Rolling Stone
- Artist: Bob Dylan
- Album: Highway 61 Revisited
Maggot Brain
- Artist: Funkadelic
- Album: Maggot Brain
Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
- Artist: Neil Young with Crazy Horse
- Album: Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
Tom Sawyer
- Artist: Rush
- Album: Exit...Stage Left
Blister in the Sun
- Artist: Violent Femmes
- Album: Violent Femmes
The Wind
- Artist: Cat Stevens
- Album: Teaser and the Firecat
Island in the Sun
- Artist: Weezer
- Album: Weezer (Green Album)
More All Songs Considered
All Songs Considered
It's Gonna Get Sweaty: A Maryland Deathfest Preview
Get your skull goblets out: Bob Boilen previews some of the bands at this year's Maryland Deathfest.
All Songs Considered
Can't We All Just Get Along? Our Search For The Albums Everyone Loves
Hosts Bob Boilen and Robin Hilton begin their quest to pin down the most universally loved albums.
All Songs Considered
Patti Smith, Best Coast, Debo Band And More
On this week's show, hear some of our favorite new tracks, plus a few musical surprises.
Comments
Please keep your community civil. All comments must follow the NPR.org Community rules and terms of use. See also the Community FAQ.
NPR reserves the right to read on the air and/or publish on its website or in any medium now known or unknown the e-mails and letters that we receive. We may edit them for clarity or brevity and identify authors by name and location. For additional information, please consult our Terms of Use.