What is the best music to listen to when summer is starting? The best pre-summer music carries forward momentum without being fully in summer mode yet. Look for songs with warmth in the production, optimism in the emotional tone, and themes of transition and anticipation. The almost-summer feeling is its own distinct and valuable mood worth a dedicated playlist.
Tomorrow the Summer Season Begins
I have butterflies today and I want to acknowledge that specifically. Tomorrow the Summer State of Mind blog era begins and everything shifts into a new season of music and conversation. But today, May 13th, belongs entirely to the almost. To the penultimate feeling. To the day before everything changes into what it has been building toward.
There is a particular quality in the air right now that I do not have a better word for than almost. Not quite summer yet. Still spring technically and legally. But you can feel that the decision has been made at some atmospheric level. The evenings are warm all the way through without any evening chill. The light stays later than seems reasonable. Something in the world has committed to what is coming.
Why Is the Almost-Summer Feeling So Powerful in Music?
I have always been someone who chases the anticipation of seasons as much as the seasons themselves. The week before a holiday. The night before a trip. The last few days before a creative launch you have been building toward for months. There is something in that almost space that is entirely its own experience, not just the absence of the main event but a genuinely distinct emotional atmosphere worth inhabiting consciously.
Almost-summer music has its own specific character. It is warmer than spring but not yet at full summer intensity. It carries hope and forward momentum and the excitement of something that is now close enough to feel completely real. That is the sonic atmosphere I am living in right now, and the music I am finishing reflects it precisely.
What Music Should You Listen to Right Now in the Almost-Summer?
For this exact moment, today, I would reach for music with warmth and forward movement that has not yet arrived at full summer exuberance. Some of the more hopeful material from Through It All has that quality. The opening tracks from Soundtrack of Your Life do too. And beginning June 8th, ‘Merica is going to be the definitive summer soundtrack from my catalog this year, so bookmark that date and have it ready the moment it arrives.
Tomorrow is when things shift publicly and I am genuinely excited to be on the other side of the announcement. Thank you for reading every word this spring. Thank you for walking through every season of this blog with me faithfully. Subscribe now if you have not already so you do not miss a single day of Summer State of Mind. The windows are about to go down and the volume is about to go all the way up.