Not Kokomo: 5 Beach Boys Songs To Whisk You Off To A Sun-Drenched Summer Escape

Many artists have songs that have come to be perennial summertime classics. The Kinks' "Sunny Afternoon," The Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer in the City," the list goes on. But there are few acts whose entire discographies have come to be so closely associated with sun, sea, and sand quite like the Beach Boys, and as these five tracks show, the '60s rock icons can still provide the ultimate summer vacation soundtrack.

Starting their career in the early part of the decade as part of the surf rock movement, the Beach Boys soon proved to be one of the most forward thinking bands of the era, on a par with the Beatles in terms of pushing the bounds of popular music, especially in the studio. But as these five tracks show, the California sun was a common source of inspiration throughout the band's career.

For this article, we have attempted to avoid the obvious hits — like "Kokomo," "I Get Around," and so on — in favor of other tracks that are still worth including on your summertime playlist. Okay, maybe we've included one semi-obvious one, but it fits the bill perfectly. Here's to the long, hot days of summer that The Beach Boys capture oh-so-well.

Possibly one of the most on-the-nose tracks about the joys of the season, "All Summer Long," from the 1964 album of the same name, is a survey of carefree warm weather fun which also manages to work as a love song and a meditation on the transitory nature of youth. It sees the narrator sitting in their car, waiting for their girlfriend to come outside, and reminiscing about the fun they've had together.

The song repeatedly tells us that "We've been having fun all summer long," and lists a range of summer activities that people like to enjoy during the summer months. Miniature golf, driving in the hills, riding horses — and cavorting in t-shirts, cut-offs, and thongs (the footwear, we're pretty sure). In short, it's typically upbeat, emotionally resonant lyricism from Brian Wilson, and it's genius.

The song is reminiscent of "I Get Around" in both its tempo and incredibly catchy vocal takes, but for some reason, it was never released as a single in the U.S. As such, it deserves more love, so be sure to give it a few spins on your next vacation.

The biggest hit on this list, the Beach Boys' "California Girls" hit No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1965, and for good reason. One of Brian Wilson's undoubted masterpieces — though bandmate Mike Love later successfully sued for a co-songwriting credit — "California Girls" is a stomp-heavy earworm that demonstrates why the members of the Beach Boys were considered some of the greatest harmonizers of all time.

Over a rich, summery, orchestral instrumental, Wilson, Mike Love, et al deliver a syrupy paean to all the girls the world over that they had encountered on tour, expressing that while all of those girls were great in their own way, none were as enticing as California girls. Though the idea of serenading womankind as a homogenous group may be somewhat dated, the vocal delivery sounds so genuine and unthreatening that you can't help but find it all rather sweet, and it remains an East Coast summer institution despite the homage it pays to girls on the opposite coast.

Wilson was especially proud of the song, telling Rolling Stone in 2015: "I sit at the piano and try, but all I want to do is rewrite 'California Girls.' How am I gonna do something better than that?" It's not a bad question for anyone to ask, even the classic song's creator.

The song that pulls together two of the key topics in the Beach Boys discography, "Surfer Girl," is a woozy waltz that perfectly captures those snoozy, dreamlike moments that sometimes occur on vacations taken during the summer months. Featuring an immaculate vocal performance by Brian Wilson backed with typically pristine harmonies, as well as unfussy drums, guitar, and bass, the song was one of the earliest that Wilson composed, with the melody coming into his head while humming along to another song on the radio.

Assumed by some to have been a song about Wilson's girlfriend at the time, Judy Bowles, Wilson later denied that the song was written about anybody in particular. Instead, it seems like it could be about a dream girl, the idealized surfer walking — or surfing — through the landscape that so inspired the Californian band.

"Surfer Girl" featured on the 1963 album of the same name, which got to No. 7 on the Billboard 200, and the song was a Top 10 single. However, "Surfer Girl" is somewhat overlooked nowadays in the Beach Boys discography, despite being a title track and a Hot 100 hit; nevertheless, it still has plenty of appeal as a hazy, lazy surf ballad.

With some songs, you can almost feel the sun and the sea air on your skin. And when it comes to the Beach Boys, it's undoubtedly "The Warmth of the Sun," an emotionally-charged ballad that prefigures The Kinks' "Sunny Afternoon" in featuring a down-on-his-luck narrator reflecting that, however bad things have gotten, they always have the sun to bring them a modicum of joy.

The 1964 track is characterized by its emotive lead vocals, tasteful string arrangement, and the timelessness of Brian Wilson's lyricism, all of which have made it a firm fan favorite despite it not being released as a single (it existed instead as an album track, and also as the B-side to "Dance, Dance, Dance"). The song is reportedly a lament inspired by the shock surrounding the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, but rather than addressing current events, the emotional song revolves around the end of a romantic relationship, with inspiration drawn from co-writer Mike Love's love life. The track perfectly balances melancholy with hope and peace, and demonstrates how the Beach Boys' summer soundtracks often carry such emotional heft.

The lush "Feel Flows," from the 1971 album "Surf's Up!" is reflective of how The Beach Boys' later sound had matured to enjoy a huge sonic palette. Indeed, far from being another surf tune, "Feel Flows" could more easily be described as a moving blend of psychedelic folk, pop, and progressive rock.

The song was composed primarily by Carl Wilson, who invited publicist Jack Reiley to pen lyrics to his unusual instrumentation. It took a great deal of experimentation and innovation in the studio to make "Feel Flows" sound as woozy as it does. As Wilson explained to Rolling Stone the year of the song's release: "I played piano twice, overdubbed it, and used a variable speed oscillator to make the track different speeds so that the piano would be a little bit out of tune ... then I put the organ on and put it through the Moog at the same time, so that one side of the stereo had the direct organ sound and the other side had the return through the Moog synthesizer."

It was one of the key songs the youngest Wilson composed for the group as he took greater control in the early 1970s, and it received rave reviews. It still sounds out of this world more than 50 years later, a gentle masterpiece that's unusually warm and relaxing for the psychedelia of the age.