Spring has arrived, but the warm weather is taking its sweet time, and I keep finding myself thinking back to the wild, joyful days of Brat summer 2024. That was a moment when everyone seemed to share the same carefree vibe—a kind of fever dream fueled by Celsius energy drinks, looking back now. This year, we might finally be past a long, harsh winter, but even with summer vacation almost here, things don’t feel all that lighthearted. Geopolitics is always on the edge of crisis, AI is everywhere, gas prices are through the roof, and the economy never seems to steady itself. So it’s no surprise I’ve been seeking comfort in nostalgia for those more reckless days.
Still, Charli XCX—the artist who sparked that big cultural shift just two summers ago—isn’t stuck in her own memories. Instead, she seems set on facing our current moment and its tough realities head-on. She’s back with a new song, and the change is striking from the moment you see the cover art. On the quiet guitar ballad “SS26,” she swaps Brat’s iconic neon green for a stark white cover with simple black text. “SS26″—short for “spring/summer 2026″—is literally a timestamp. And if Charli’s right, it marks a pretty grim future: “The world is gonna end, no hope for any of it / yeah, we’re walkin’ on a runway that goes straight to hell / nothing’s gonna save us, not music, fashion or film,” she sings in a pleading tone.
There’s a common idea about so-called “songs of the summer”: they’re always upbeat and fun, like Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” (2024) or Katy Perry’s “California Gurls” (2010), bringing to mind alcohol, beaches, bikinis, and sunshine. But Charli’s somber new track reminds us of another key part of hot weather: those long, love-struck days can lead to longing and sadness. In fact, some of the best songs about summer—like Sublime’s “Doin’ Time” (1996) and Calvin Harris’s “Summer” (2014)—are filled with ache and regret.
“A lot of songs about summer have a wistful quality,” says DJ Louie XIV, host of the popular music podcast Pop Pantheon. “There’s a sense of fleetingness, a brief moment. By nature, we often look back on life, with summer as that longed-for time in the past we can’t return to. That’s what can be inherently sad about a summer song: they capture a memory, one we might now see from a completely different perspective.”
To Louie, there’s something deeper in the contrast at the heart of Charli’s new sad summer anthem. She’s one of the world’s most famous It girls—an icon of late nights and good times—but she’s also an artist trying to reflect our world’s reality through music. The result is a song built on a central irony: the kind of entertainment she creates can be a welcome escape from tough times, but it can’t protect us from the real dangers lurking around us. In other words, “SS26” might be a bit of a downer—but maybe that’s the kind of summer song we deserve in a time filled with so much cultural anxiety.
“She’s tapping into the feeling of living through global turmoil, from Trump to climate change, and still just figuring out how to put on our sunglasses and move forward as best we can,” Louie says. “How do you deal with the existential dread of our current existence? Here we are, in the middle of history, trying to find ways to seek joy and love and live our lives—it inspires this idea Charli is getting at, which is that there’s always a risk we’re just going to party ourselves off a cliff.”
It’s not just Charli who’s stuck in this heavy headspace; many contenders for 2026’s song of the summer aren’t exactly upbeat either. Ella Langley’s “Choosin’ Texas,” which has been on the charts all year, is a country ballad that seems destined to be heard all summer blasting fromBoats drift across the lake, and backyard barbecues are in full swing. But this song is filled with longing and tears—it’s about a cowboy who leaves a Tennessee girl with nothing but a bottle of Jack Daniels when he heads back to his dusty home in Texas. Ariana Grande is also making a return with Petal; the first taste of the album is a bitter one, a slow, unhappy ballad called “hate that I made you love me.” It includes lyrics about laying flowers on someone’s cold, dead grave and bumblebees stuck in globs of honey.
Then there’s Kim Petras’s excellent new song “Jeep,” which she says was inspired by evacuating her home during the 2025 Palisades fires. She had to pack everything she owned into her car and escape to the desert. As for Olivia Rodrigo’s take on the national mood? The title of her latest album’s first single says it all: “Drop Dead.” This is definitely not “Party Rock Anthem.”
“Sure, sometimes songs are meant to take us to some imaginary place where everything is fun and shiny, but to me, the most important artists touch on the reality of the world—and right now, that reality isn’t always great,” says Bethany Cosentino of the band Best Coast. She released a sad summer masterpiece back in July 2010 with the indie rock classic Crazy for You. On that album, she sang about romantic indecision and emotional confusion, all bathed in the golden haze of her hometown, Los Angeles. More than a decade later, in 2023, she released a song called “Natural Disaster,” inspired by climate anxiety. “In summer, there’s this pressure to be posting your amazing Cape Cod vacation. You’re supposed to be out frolicking, running through sprinklers with a White Claw, getting a tan. But the truth is, a lot of people are just trying to get by.”
Another artist competing for Song of the Summer this year is Drake, who surprised everyone by releasing three (!) new albums in May after lying low for years following a knockout fight with Kendrick Lamar. Lamar famously landed some lethal blows on the Canadian rapper with the diss track “Not Like Us,” which became its own kind of Song of the Summer back in 2024, blasting from car radios and Bluetooth speakers in Central Park. Now, Drake is returning battered and bruised, with one of his albums called Iceman—as if to say he’s destined (or doomed) to stay hardened and cold, no matter the weather outside. Over the years, he’s recorded plenty of summer songs, but because he’s always had a bit of an emo soul, many of them—like “Passionfruit” (2017) and “In My Feelings” (2018)—have a shiny surface over a sadder core. Across this latest three-album effort, he sounds wiser and on the defensive, while still desperately trying to win us over with the fun track “Cheetah Print.” But the song that’s probably gotten the most attention—and hit #1 on the Billboard charts—is the sharp, resentful “Janice STFU.”
Looking back over the years, some of my favorite summer songs have been downers. The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Californication,” released in June 1999, is a rock ballad that flips our glossy image of sunny SoCal by focusing on Hollywood’s seedy side. As a kid, I remember seeing the music video on MTV; the band members were turned into characters in a video game, which reflected (at least to my teenage soul) the loneliness of school-free boredom. Even though it’s beautiful outside, all there is to do is get lost in the digital world of Zelda. Joni Mitchell’s “Woodstock” (1970) is an elegy for the famous August 1969 music festival, sung from the perspective of someone who missed it—Mitchell was stuck in the city and couldn’t make it. Country singer Zach Bryan, whose acoustic ballads are perfect for sitting on a porch surrounded by wheat fields, released “Summertime’s Close” in 2024, a requiem about the days cooling off and ocean waves that crash a little too harshly on the shore.When I think of summer anthems, the first one that always comes to mind is “Summertime Sadness” (2012) by Lana Del Rey—a lasting tribute to seasonal depression. Ironically, the song really took off after an EDM remix hit the clubs in the summer of 2013; the 2010s were a simpler time. In the music video, a young woman jumps off a cliff after a love affair ends. A few summers ago, during the heat of July, I was lucky enough to interview Lana at the Santa Monica studio where she recorded “Summertime Sadness.” When we talked about the song, she pointed out the window at the phone cables lining the nearby Los Angeles street. She told me that’s where she got the idea for the lyric “telephone wires above sizzling like a snare.” In that moment, I realized that no matter how universal songs become, at their best, they come from a specific place. “Summertime Sadness” isn’t just a pop song—it’s a small piece of memory, a poem Lana wrote when she was feeling a real kind of summer sorrow.
It’s hard to talk about the music scene in 2026 without mentioning Taylor Swift, who released an album last fall and now has a beautifully sad ballad called “Elizabeth Taylor” simmering on the current SOTS playlist. For me, Taylor’s most summery moment will always be her pandemic masterpiece, Folklore, recorded in the outdoorsy setting of Upstate New York. Many people associate Folklore with autumn, and Swift does paint a picture of falling leaves and cozy beanies. But actually, Folklore came out at the end of July 2020, and one of its key songs is the lovely “August”—a slow tribute to the bittersweet end of young summer love on a New England beach. “August” shows Swift at her best: nostalgic, melancholy, and able to capture a mood or a memory so deeply in her music that it starts to blend with our own. It’s a bittersweet summer anthem that makes us happy to sit in the sand, but also reminds us—through mentions of rust and the return of school—that eventually we’ll have to go back inside.
I’d argue that the real power of “August” lies in how its very name subtly hints at summer’s most unavoidable truth: that September is coming. Summer means different things to different people, but whether you love it or hate it, it’s temporary, fleeting, and destined to fade as we move toward a more serious season. For some, fall is a relief if summer wasn’t happy (a boyfriend once dumped me a few days before July 4, and the fireworks and celebration seemed to mock me all holiday weekend—goodbye to all that). But it’s hard not to feel at least a little sad about time passing and the thought of all the green and blue turning to red, brown, and gray. Winter always shows up eventually. “‘August’ perfectly captures the idea that as we get older, the months just fly by,” says Cosentino. “I remember being young on summer vacation, with school out, and it felt like it would last forever. But now that you’re an adult, you look up, and bam, summer’s over.”
For me, the real test of a Song of the Summer has always been whether I keep playing it long after the leaves change. I personally love summer, and I try to hold onto its heat (and tan lines) as far into fall as possible, using music to keep that feeling alive. My favorite seasonal song might be Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon” (1992), a tribute to the lunar event that sits between cycles, appearing around the equinox. What’s been planted can now be harvested, and in the lyrics, Young also honors his longtime wife, Pegi, celebrating the gifts that only lasting love—not summer’s fleeting pleasures—can bring. To me, “Harvest Moon” has always been a reminder that life’s playlist keeps shuffling, eventually moving to a different song for a different season. You can only hope it’s a happy one, no matter the weather.
Frequently Asked Questions
Here is a list of FAQs about the best sad summer songs written in a natural tone with clear direct answers
BeginnerLevel Questions
1 Why would I want to listen to sad songs in the summer Isnt summer supposed to be happy
Sad songs can actually feel really good in the summer They help you process emotions like heartbreak nostalgia or missing someone and the warm weather and long days can make those feelings feel more intense and poetic rather than just depressing
2 Whats the difference between a regular sad song and a sad summer song
A sad summer song usually has a specific vibe It often features hazy dreamy production lyrics about long days beaches or road trips and a bittersweet feeling Its less about pure anger or despair and more about lonely nostalgia or a beautiful kind of melancholy
3 Can you give me a few classic examples of sad summer songs
Sure Think of Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift The Night We Met by Lord Huron Summertime Sadness by Lana Del Rey and Boys of Summer by Don Henley
4 Are these songs good for a summer road trip playlist
Absolutely Theyre perfect for driving with the windows down at sunset staring out the window on a long bus ride or sitting on a quiet beach They match the feeling of motion and reflection
5 Whats the best time of day to listen to sad summer songs
Most people say sunset or late at night The golden hour light and the quiet of the evening make the sad nostalgic feelings hit the hardest
Advanced Nuanced Questions
6 What are some modern or deep cut sad summer songs that arent the obvious hits
For deeper cuts try Myth by Beach House Pink White by Frank Ocean Motion Sickness by Phoebe Bridgers The Only Exception by Paramore or 808s Heartbreak era Kanye West tracks like Street Lights
7 Some sad summer songs sound happy but have sad lyrics Why is that so effective
Thats called lyrical