The Boys of Summer (song)

"The Boys of Summer"
Single by Don Henley from the album Building the Perfect Beast
B-side	"A Month of Sundays"
Released	December 1984
Format	7-inch
Recorded	1984
Genre	Rock
Length	04:47
Label	Geffen Records
Writer	Don Henley, Mike Campbell
Producer	Don Henley, Danny Kortchmar, Greg Ladanyi, Mike Campbell
Don Henley singles chronology
"Dirty Laundry" (1983) "The Boys of Summer" (1984) "All She Wants to Do Is Dance" (1985)

"The Boys of Summer" is a song sung by Don Henley, written by him and Mike Campbell. It is the lead track and first single from Henley's 1984 album Building the Perfect Beast.

History

Driven by synthesizers and drum machines, the song has a haunting rhythm and feel throughout the intro, bridge, and verses, but a 'summer-ey' hook and guitar tones. It is widely speculated that the song is about the passing of youth and entering middle age, with the obvious theme of 'summer love' apparent in the choruses, and of reminiscence of a past relationship. The line, "My love for you will still be strong, after the boys of summer have gone" can be construed as a realization that relationships are often destroyed by one's own restless youth, even though there is a conflicting internal desire for that love to flourish. Although the title is a common nickname for baseball players, and shares its name with the 1971 book The Boys of Summer by Roger Kahn, which centers on the 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers championship team, Henley has stated in interviews that the song is obviously not about baseball players. The Dylan Thomas poem, "I See the Boys of Summer," also contains the same phrase. After a mid-way instrumental break is perhaps the song's most famous lyric: "Out on the road today I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac." This image of once-countercultural Deadheads driving establishment status symbol Cadillacs immediately connected with Henley's age group, and neatly encapsulated the song's feelings of loss and aging. It is rumored that this line was inspired by Henley seeing Joe Walsh driving a Cadillac with a Deadhead sticker on it while on Sunset Blvd. "The Boys of Summer" was a big hit, reaching number 5 on the U.S. pop singles chart and topping the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. It was also a hit in the United Kingdom, reaching number 12 on the UK Singles Chart. A re-release of the single in 1998 also reached #12. Henley won the Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for the song. "The Boys of Summer" was ranked #416 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Music video

The music video to "The Boys of Summer" is a French New Wave-influenced piece directed by Jean-Baptiste Mondino. Shot completely in black-and-white, it shows the 'main character' of the song at three different stages of life (as a young boy, a young adult and middle-aged), in each case reminiscing about the past relationship. This is shown during the line "A little voice inside my head said don't look back, you can never look back" at which point, each of the three people look back in turn. The young boy in the video resembles Henley to the extent that he also is a left-handed drummer. The cutaways of the "boys" jumping in the air appears to have been influenced by the 1938 film Olympia. Interspersed with these scenes are segments of Henley miming the words of the song while driving in a convertible. At its conclusion, the video uses the post-modern conceit of exposing its own workings, as with a wry expression Henley drives the car away from a rear projection screen. The video won the Video of the Year at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards (leading Henley to comment at the Awards the following year that he had won for "riding around in the back of a pickup"). It also won that year's awards for Best Direction, Best Art Direction, and Best Cinematography. The Best Direction award was presented to Mondino by Henley's then-former Eagles bandmate, Glenn Frey.

Other versions

• The Ataris also did a cover version of this song which was generally well received.
  • This video was ranked #23 on Rolling Stone magazine's "The 100 Top Music Videos".
  • This video was ranked #67 on MTV's 100 Greatest Videos Ever Made.
  • This video was ranked #53 on VH1's 100 Greatest Videos.
• In 1985, Detroit radio station WRIF's "JJ & The Morning Crew" (Jim Johnson & George Baier) released a parody version called "After the Brewery on Gratiot is Gone," when the Stroh Brewery Company demolished its original Detroit brewery.
• The song was performed by Codeseven, an alternative band, on their 1998 album A Sense of Coalition.
• Singer-songwriter Bree Sharp released a cover of the song on her 2002 album More B.S.
• In 2002, a cover version was released by DJ Sammy and was a top 10 hit worldwide.
• In 2003, the song again became a Top 40 hit covered by American punk band The Ataris. The Ataris' sped-up version, which appeared on their album So Long, Astoria, changed the Deadhead mention to "Black Flag sticker ...", a reference to the Henry Rollins-fronted punk band. This recording made it to #20 on the Billboard Hot 100 and appeared on a number of other American charts as well, scoring highest at #2 on Modern Rock Tracks. It also peaked at #49 on the UK Singles chart. Soon after The Ataris' version became a hit, lead singer/guitarist Kris Roe began publicly sporting a T-shirt reading, "Who The F*** Is Don Henley?", which caused some misunderstanding and controversy.[1] In contrast, the DJ Sammy version was a hit overseas, reaching #2 in the UK and #10 in Australia.
• A version of the song is also performed Norwegians Espen Lind, Kurt Nilsen (of World Idol fame), Alejandro Fuentes and Askil Holm on their very popular 2006 live album, Hallelujah. Later in 2006, pop-punk band Simple Plan performed a version which sounds similar to the Ataris' version, although with a slightly faster beat. Swedish indiepop outfit Nixon covered the song on their 2003 album Snow Day.
• "The Boys of Summer" is also performed by Henley with the reunited Eagles when on tour; such a version is included on the group's 2005 Farewell 1 Tour-Live from Melbourne DVD.
• An acoustic version of this song was performed by the Custom Kings on the Australian radio station Triple J. It was performed on the 1st of September, 2006, on the Like a Version segment of the Mel in the Morning program.
• The Hooters recorded a version that featured mandolins, piano, acoustic guitars, and harmony vocals on their 2007 album Time Stand Still after performing the song as a fan favorite during their live shows the previous three years.
• At the end of 2007, Romanian-based electronic musician, DJ and record producer SLAPPER covered the song on compilation "Fresh Oldies vol.IV" - a free tribute album to his great "inspirations" like: Sparks, Vangelis, Genesis, Alphaville, Simple Minds, Blondie and many others.

External links

• Video on VH1 Classic