Welcome to travels with Todd

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The connective tissue between the titles of the posts about my Australia trip was the Charles Dickens Novel – A Tale of Two Cities. I borrowed a phrase or sentence from that novel to use as the title for all but the first two of the 48 posts recounting that trip. While their use in the context of the novel rarely had any connection to the content of the post, the phrase or sentiment it expressed did. At least for me.

I used a similar approach in choosing the titles for my trip to Aotearoa New Zealand. The source for nearly all the post titles from the outset of the Road Scholar portion of that trip is a song with summer in its title. The exception, for reasons I think the post makes obvious, is “Waimangu – Old black water keep on rolling.” In most instances I used the opening lyric or a portion of it if it contained the word summer because I wanted to make your thematic identification just a trifle more challenging.

Here are the songs.

Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days.

Those Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of Summer – Composed by Hans Carste with the original German lyrics by Hans Bradtke. Charles Tobias wrote the English lyrics and Nat King Cole made the song famous.

End of the spring And here she comes back.

This is the opening two lines from the Sly and the Family Stone 1969 classic Hot Fun in the Summertime. Sly Stone is the composer and lyricist.

Nobody on the road – Pākehā Arrive.

Don Henley recorded The Boys of Summer a song he co-wrote with Mike Campbell in 1984. It reached number five on Billboard’s Hot 100.

See the curtains hanging in the window – Auckland day 2.

Before it became the title of one of my posts, this line opened the 1972 Seals and Crofts hit Summer Breeze.

…and the pavements are burning – Musket Wars and Waitangi.

Cruel Summer was first released by Bananarama in 1983. Fifteen years later it became the title track from the 1998 Ace of Base album of the same name. The full opening lyric is. “Hot summer streets and the pavements are burning.” The song has five co-composers with four credited as contributing to the lyrics (Follow the link then scroll down for the list.). Here’s the Bananarama original.

…back of my neck gettin’ dirty and gritty – Māngere Mountain.

I returned to the sixties again (1966 to be exact) for this one – the Lovin’ Spoonful’s Summer in the City. Writing credits go to Steve Boone and John and Mark Sebastian. The full lyric is, “Hot child summer in the city back of my neck gettin’ dirty and gritty.”

…it happened one time.

Martha Davis, lead singer for the new wave band The Motels wrote Suddenly Last Summer, the band’s biggest hit. It reached number nine on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1983. The song begins, “It happened one summer, it happened one time.”

Waimangu – Old black water keep on rolling.

The signal that this title is different comes from having the Aotearoa New Zealand aspect before the lyric rather than after it. Not only does The Doobie Brothers hit Black Water not have summer in the title but the Patrick Simmons composition isn’t a summer song per se. It was, however, the perfect fit for visiting the place Māori call Waimangu or black water.

The sun struggles up another beautiful day – Afternoon at Te Puia.

Someone once described Elvis Costello’s The Other Side of Summer as “Elvis Costello at his bitingly cynical best.” You can decide for yourselves.

I’m a-gonna raise a fuss.

I’m a-gonna raise a holler.

Sometimes I wonder what I’m a-gonna do.

Since I felt I needed three posts to describe an exceptionally busy Friday and since I had some complaints to vent, I decided to use the opening two lines plus a third from Summertime Blues because they seemed appropriate. Eddie Cochrane and his manager Jerry Capehart earn the writing credits. Here’s the original Eddie Cochrane version.

…wakes you up with a kiss to start the morning off.

Those who read my account of my 2023 trip around southern and central Michigan certainly know I’m a Stevie Wonder fan and might recognize this lyric from his song Summer Soft. The song title also fills in the missing phrase from the lyric.

Well, the streetlights shine.

I can’t point to any reason for choosing Bruce Springsteen’s Girls in Their Summer Clothes other than the fact that we were in Ōtautahi Christchurch – Aotearoa New Zealand’s second largest city. Well, that, and maybe because even though it’s not his best work, he is The Boss, after all.

…and the livin’ is easy.

It was an easy day and if you’d picked up on the summer connection, you had to expect the George Gershwin / DuBose Heyward classic Summertime to have it’s head pop up sometime. Again, the title completes the ellipsis. There are so many great versions of this song I found it hard to choose one but, in the end, settled on Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong.

Feel free to choose another if you prefer.

…came blowin’ in from across the sea.

Here’s a fact you might not know about the song Summer Wind. Like the first song on this list, it was originally written in German. Heinz Meier composed it with Hans Bradtke once again providing the original lyric for Der Sommerwind. Johnny Mercer penned the English lyrics and Francis Albert Sinatra the recording I’ve included. The complete opening line is, “The summer wind came blowin’ in from across the sea.”

…when the weather is high.

The first three words in this song’s opening line, “In the summertime” are the song’s title and it was made famous by Mungo Jerry. Written by Ray Dorset, the entire first verse felt particularly appropriate to the day.

Street lights crystalize the city.

You’ll probably recognize this lyric if you’re a fan of either John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band or the movie Eddie and the Cruisers for which Cafferty supplied the songs. The song is Wild Summer Nights.

Saw you at the fall – Picture on a closed circuit.

This is the opening couplet from Aimee Mann’s Lies of Summer. Yes, politicians sometimes lie but for me, it was the second line that connected this song to the post. I’m sure we were on more than one closed circuit monitor as we passed through Parliament.

Fever dream high in the quiet of the night.

Why would I think the opening line of Taylor Swift’s song Cruel Summer that’s ostensibly about a secret summer romance was appropriate for this post? Because my brain works in mysterious ways and I thought the realities created at the Wētā Workshop are something of a fever dream. So there (and here) you have it.

Tell me what you want, what you like.

This is from Demi Lovato’s Cool Summer. I chose it because there was much to like about the day and because the overseers of Zealandia Te Māra a Tāne want to accomplish so much. I also liked the idea of following Cruel Summer with Cool Summer.

This post had a bonus song embedded in it. Lyrics from the Theme from Summer of ’42 (The Summer Knows) make up each of the section headers. I simply had to find a way to include this song that features not only a beautiful Michel Legrand melody but lyrics by Marilyn and Alan Bergman that are, in my opinion, among the best ever written. Here’s Johnny Mathis singing it for you.

You can feel it in the streets.

The song is Feels Like Summer by Donald Glover (AKA Childish Gambino) who co-wrote the song with Ludwig Göransson. For me, the connection with Banksy and the street was a no-brainer.

And that wraps up the presentation of my summer songs of Aotearoa New Zealand. (I realize I haven’t explained the reasoning underlying each of my song choices. If you’re curious, post your question in a comment or contact me privately if you prefer.)