Len’s “Steal My Sunshine” was the ultimate summer single — catchy and laid-back, with references to heat, fun, lying on the grass and “big fat slurpy treats.” But if you believe the 11-year-old band, which scored a No. 1 hit and landed on MTV’s “Total Request Live” during the summer of 1999, the timing was pure coincidence.
“We’re drunk most of the time and we just don’t have that much coordination,” says Sharon Costanzo, the Canadian singer whose high choruses backed her brother’s raps on the laid-back tune. “I don’t think we could make a summer single if we wanted to — it’s just a matter of whatever feels right at the time. I don’t know how other people do it. I can’t even imagine. We honestly just make songs, and it’s whenever.”
Thirty years after the Beach Boys made a career of classic summer singles, musicians have learned that lyrics about sun, sand, bikinis and convertibles set to upbeat rock ‘n’ roll is an almost invincible hit-making formula. It gives artists entree to the fast track of MTV, big movie sound tracks and big-time radio stations. The catch is — remember Michael Sembello’s “Maniac” in 1983 or OMC’s “How Bizarre” in 1997? — that successful summer singles can also turn promising artists sharply down the path to one-hit wonderland.
Playing down the hype
Some musicians are so worried about such a fate that they openly sneer at their summer-single accomplishments. Len’s follow-up to the band’s debut “You Can’t Stop the Bum Rush” is due later this summer. “Considering [`Steal My Sunshine’] is the only thing people have heard from us, it’s kind of a bit weird,” Costanzo says. “It’s kind of like, `[expletive], here we go again.’-“
That won’t stop many artists from trying over the next few months. Rappers Eminem, Nelly and Will Smith have recently released new albums or will put them out soon; upbeat Pink, Usher and P. Diddy singles topped the pop charts going into Memorial Day weekend; and Sheryl Crow’s latest top-40 single, “Soak Up the Sun,” is, so far, the most obvious candidate for Official Theme Song for the Summer of 2002. “Nobody ever voices that goal to us, but it’s something people strive toward,” says Amy Doyle, MTV’s vice president of music programming.
“People are in a different mind-set — they want to have fun, they’re on vacation. It definitely works out much better for songs that have a summer theme and tempo to them,” Doyle adds. “But you run into the danger of being a one-hit wonder. You run into the niche of being ‘the artist behind the summer anthem.’.”
The prototypical summer anthems arrive in summer, of course, and are actually about summer. Aside from the Beach Boys’ “California Girls” and “Surfer Girl,” the classic case study is Lovin’ Spoonful’s 1966 rock-radio mainstay “Summer in the City.” DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince’s “Summertime,” about honking at honeys from Jeeps on the streets, dominated the airwaves in 1991 — and helped lead rapper Will Smith make the transition into smash summer movies. Five years later, he starred in “Independence Day.”
It’s not a seasonal thing
But some of the most definitive summer songs in pop history ignore the calendar altogether. The Surfaris’ classic surf anthem “Wipe Out,” for example, was first heard in January 1963. The Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations” was an October hit, and “Fun, Fun, Fun” entered the charts in February. And some ignore the required subject material: Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog” perfectly captured a hot Memphis day in 1956 without mentioning the word “summer”; John Fogerty’s 1985 album “Centerfield” indirectly invoked summer by focusing on baseball; and in Ricky Martin’s 1999 breakthrough “Livin’ La Vida Loca,” it rains.
Crow unashamedly went the summer route for her latest single, “Soak Up the Sun,” which just hit No. 32. She defined the song’s style in a recent USA Today interview: “I really wanted to have the energy of that old-time rock ‘n’ roll and a sort of summerlike release — that feeling of, `OK, school’s out, let’s get in our cars and go be wild,’-” said Crow, an established rocker who’s beyond worrying about summer-single stereotypes.
Such a definition, of course, benefits local radio stations. “When the weather warms up, people’s attitudes change. People’s spirits pick up. They’re out more, they’re rollerblading, they’re having barbecues on the weekends,” says Todd Cavanah, program director for Chicago’s top-40 station WBBM-FM 96.3. “The radio is on. It’s mobile. You can take it with you.”
That’s just the logic Tina Novak, a 23-year-old Chicago-born pop singer, hopes will kick in when her second single, “Summertime,” comes out next month. Although the song is more Britney Spears than Beach Boys, it’s upbeat and catchy, with all the touchstone seasonal themes. In fact, says Novak, who moved to Florida when she was 6 and lives in Tampa, her record label is already discussing promotions with MTV.
Take what you’re given
Novak didn’t write “Summertime” — “first-time artists don’t get a lot of input” on their debuts, she says — but she lived in her producer’s beachside mansion with 16 other writers, performers and engineers while making the CD. Written with Novak’s “convertible, top-down, cruise under the bridges” lifestyle in mind, “Summertime” was the first song the crew recorded.
Executives from Novak’s label, Arista Records, say they didn’t create “Summertime” purely to sell records this summer. But they’re not exactly bemoaning the timing.
“That, obviously, you wouldn’t be putting out in the winter,” says Steve Bartels, one of the label’s senior vice presidents. “It’s got that vibe, the whole sensibility. It wasn’t designed, necessarily, to be our single in that time frame, but it sounds great and we need to get it out now rather than later.”
Plus, it fits the image Novak chooses for herself.
“I remember watching the summer MTV programs and thinking how perfect it’d be if I could do that — because it’s me,” she says in a phone interview. ” I’m the beach girl.”
A summer song sampler
A collection of tunes that remind us of endless summers, based on strong sales during summer months, according to “The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits.”
1964: “I Get Around” (Beach Boys)
1965: “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” (The Rolling Stones)
1966: “Summer in the City” (Lovin Spoonful)
1967: “Light My Fire” (The Doors)
1968: “Grazing in the Grass” (Hugh Masekela)
1969: “Honky Tonk Women” (The Rolling Stones)
1970: “(They Long to Be) Close to You” (The Carpenters)
1971: “It’s Too Late” (Carole King)
1972: “Alone Again (Naturally)” (Gilbert O’Sullivan)
1973: “My Love” (Paul McCartney and Wings)
1974: “Sundown” (Gordon Lightfoot)
1975: “Love Will Keep Us Together” (The Captain & Tennille)
1976: “Afternoon Delight” (Starland Vocal Band)
1977: “I Just Want to Be Your Everything” (Andy Gibb)
1978: “Shadow Dancing” (Andy Gibb)
1979: “Bad Girls” (Donna Summer)
1980: “Magic” (Olivia Newton-John)
1981: “Bette Davis Eyes” (Kim Carnes)
1982: “Eye of the Tiger” (Survivor)
1983: “Every Breath You Take” (The Police)
1984: “When Doves Cry” (Prince)
1985: “Shout” (Tears for Fears)
1986: “Papa Don’t Preach” (Madonna)
1987: “La Bamba” (Los Lobos)
1988: “Roll With It” (Steve Winwood)
1989: “Right Here Waiting” (Richard Marx)
1990: “Vision of Love” (Mariah Carey)
1991: “Rush, Rush” (Paula Abdul)
1992: “Baby Got Back” (Sir Mix-A-Lot)
1993: “That’s the Way Love Goes” (Janet Jackson)
1994: “I Swear” (All-4-One)
1995: “Waterfalls” (TLC)
1996: “Macarena” (Los Del Rio)
1997: “I’ll Be Missing You” (Puff Daddy and Faith Evans)
1998: “The Boy Is Mine” (Brandy and Monica)
1999: “If You Had My Love” (Jennifer Lopez) (the performer’s name as published has been corrected in this text).
2000: “The Real Slim Shady” (Eminem)
2001: “Survivor” (Destiny’s Child) (the song title as published has been corrected in this text).
