Top Ten Songs of the Summer
#1 – The Police – ‘Every Breath You Take’ (1983)
If The Police’s ‘Every Breath You Take’ is an option for a list like this, you can bet it’s going to end up at #1. The only way another song could have claimed this spot is if A-Ha’s ‘Take On Me’ had made the Song of the Summer cut by peaking in July instead of October of 1984.
This is simply a perfect song, with Andy Summers’ hypnotic guitar lick and Sting’s impassioned vocals combining to form an addictive, creepily romantic vibe.
‘Every Breath You Take’ was not just the biggest song of that summer, but the top song of 1983, period. It spent a full two months at #1, giving The Police their only chart-topper in the U.S.
So there you have it… the ten greatest Songs of the Summer, according to me.
As I write this, it’s still neck-and-neck between Post Malone’s ‘I Had Some Help’ and Shaboozey’s ‘A Bar Song (Tipsy)’ for this year’s title. With its seventh week at #1, the most this year, I think the Shaboozey track might just pull it out in the final week. I like both of those songs quite a bit, but they don’t hold a candle to any of the hits I’ve been featuring.
Every breath you take
And every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
I’ll be watching you
[Verse 2]
Every single day
And every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay
I’ll be watching you
[Chorus]
Oh, can’t you see
You belong to me?
How my poor heart aches
With every step you take
[Verse 3]
Every move you make
And every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
I’ll be watching you
[Bridge]
Since you’ve gone, I’ve been lost without a trace
I dream at night, I can only see your face
I look around, but it’s you I can’t replace
I feel so cold, and I long for your embrace
I keep crying, baby, baby, please
[Middle-Eight]
Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm
Mmm, mmm, mmm
[Chorus]
Oh, can’t you see
You belong to me?
How my poor heart aches
With every step you take
[Verse 4]
Every move you make
And every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
I’ll be watching you
[Refrain]
Every move you make
Every step you take
I’ll be watching you
Meet Me In Montauk 
Shaboozey my ass! I continue to hear “Espresso” EVERYWHERE. On the radio, in stores, at the gym. While it may not have hit number one, it has remained high on the charts all summer long. This is the musical equivalent to E.T losing Best Picture to Ghandi or Goodfellas losing to Dances with Wolves. I dissent!
Well, Billboard made the final call on Wednesday, and the 2024 Song of the Summer is…. Post Malone/Morgan Wallen’s ‘I Had Some Help.’
I think your E.T./Goodfellas analogy fails because the Best Picture Oscar is voted on by Academy members (who have specific and questionable taste), while SotS is a pure numbers question. If Best Picture was decided by box office, E.T. would have won Best Picture and Goodfellas and Dances with Wolves would have lost to Ghost.
The question is whether Billboard has the right formula to determine what people are listening to. According to their site, the Hot 100 is determined by “singles sales, radio airplay, digital downloads, and streaming activity.” If that criteria finds that ‘I Had Some Help’ was more popular than ‘Espresso,’ who are we to argue?
I think the broader issue is that music consumption is a lot more stratified these days. Millions of people clearly spent a lot of time with the Post Malone song while never listening to ‘Espresso.’ You and I and the people we hang out with were more prone to play ‘Espresso.’ I know a whole lot of Kendrick Lamar fans were shocked to learn that ‘Not Like Us’ wasn’t the Song of the Summer — and that’s a song I literally hadn’t heard until a week ago.
The problem with Billboard’s approach is having a formula or criteria at all. There is an intangible, ubiquitous, omnipresent element to a Song of the Summer. It is the song playing in the mall, on the beach, on the radio – part of the zeitgeist. It is the song that is inescapable – such as the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling,” which only YOU managed to avoid when it was played incessantly EVERYWHERE in 2009, leading to your concerted effort thereafter to know and blog about “what the kids are listening to.”
So my point about the movies I mentioned has nothing to do with the criteria – it has to do with what will be remembered 20, 30, 40 years from now – when our grandchildren will look at the Song of the Summer list and have no earthly idea what “I Had Some Help” is and wonder why “Espresso” wasn’t the SotS in 2024.😉
I don’t disagree with you in principle, but I’d counter that there isn’t a zeitgeist anymore in the way there was even ten years ago.
After all, ‘I Gotta Feeling’ was the official Song of the Summer in 2009 by Billboard’s criteria, not just yours. Same goes for ‘Umbrella’ and ‘Call Me Maybe.’
Their formula is capturing what’s playing at the mall, on the beach, and on the radio, in addition to what people are buying. Apart from taking a poll of every music listener in the U.S., how else would you come up with the Song of the Summer?
The only Espresso I know is the one I drink in a cup. However today’s song IS just perfect. Love it 😍
But wasn’t “Espresso” disqualified because it peaked at number 2? As between the two songs, which has spent more weeks in the top 10? Top 5?
Interestingly, Billboard named “Espresso” the global song of the summer for 2024. https://www.billboard.com/music/chart-beat/sabrina-carpenter-espresso-number-one-global-song-of-the-summer-2024-1235766400/
So, I maintain it’s “Espresso” that should take the 2024 SotS crown!
No, ‘Espresso’ peaked at #3 and both ‘I Had Some Help’ and ‘Tipsy’ spent more time in the top five than it did. In fact, they both spent more time at #1 than ‘Espresso’ spent in the top five.