We did have the striped shirts, tight jeans and crimped hair, at least. Songwriter Rickie Lee Jones says, The definitive summers were beaches and surf shirts and bare feet and going out and not having to tell anybody. In Phoenix in 1968, the song was Keep On Running by the Spencer Davis Group. In Kansas City, Missouri, in August 1970, Ohio by Neil Young was on the jukebox at some redneck barbecue, and I played it in defiance of all the people around me, or so I felt. I am always there again when I hear it.
Summer is about defiance, in a way, something in the air.
The best one I ever made for hot summer nights in the car was inspired by and taped during the L.A. riots in 92. It was the perfect soundtrack for that summer, one of the most tragic times in the city I can remember. Tony Reflex, lead singer with L.A. punk band the Adz, points out that touring during summer isn t always a beach. Bar has to be the most humid place in L.A. Anyone who needs to know what it s like to be in Texas during a heat wave should do a 40-minute set at Al s in August. Balls hang out of polyester shorts lewdly.