The Rebel Black Dot Summer Song of the Day

Fountains of Wayne, "The Summer Place" from Sky Full of Holes (Mike Papa Whiskey)

Commentary: A couple weeks back, when the R.B.D.S.O.T.D. was a veritable track listing of Sky Full of Holes, I listened to "The Summer Place" over & over & over again, but refrained from selecting it, preferring to reserve it for this end-o'-the-long-summer musical fête. Last week, in "This Week in Motorsport: Triskaidekaphobia," I quoted a few lines of verse from Bill Willingham's often clever comic book Fables. I quote those same lines again, because even aside from all the shuffling off of this mortal coil, this has been a far from ideal summer.

The cruel, hot summer
led into the long, hard fall,
becoming the dark, killing winter
until spring replenished us all.

I'd already planned to feature a week of summer songs in the run-up to Labor Day, America's unofficial close to the summer & beginning of the fall, but added weight was accorded the exercise this morning when I observed a goodly number of fallen leaves lying on the grass. The heat persists & could well linger well into October, but the days are already grown noticeably shorter as we sit two-thirds of the way from the summer solstice to the autumnal equinox. The world, quite apart from our culture, is taking note of the change of the season. But, in the words of Elwood Blues, "while we still can," let us revel in a few songs of summer, of endless possibilities limited only by our ambition.

"Oh! At the summer place
We've got the space if you've got the time,
And the summer place
Is so far away it's another state of mind…"