When I was young before I had cassettes, the only good way of making a playlist of songs was to stack 45s on the turntable. I would arrange for them to play my favorite songs in my favorite order. These posts are about records I had in my stacks.
“Summer Breeze” was the first single, released nine days preceding Seals and Crofts’ 4th album, also named Summer Breeze. It would reach number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The song was written by Jim Seals and Dash Crofts and released on August 31, 1972. This is a great song and got a lot of play in my stacks.
…one of those relentlessly appealing 1970s harmony-rock anthems … appropriately ubiquitous on the radio and in the memory
Bruce Eder – Allmusic
The B-side was “East of Ginger Trees” with beautiful acoustic and mandolin guitars. This tune was also written by Seals and Crofts who harmonize perfectly like on all their tunes. Harvey Brooks played bass on this recording and “Summer Breeze”. This is a great B-side.
We operate on a different level, we try to create images, impressions and trains of thought in the minds of our listeners.
Jim Seals
Lyrics
“Summer Breeze”
See the curtains hangin’ in the window
In the evening on a Friday night
A little light a-shinin’ through the window
Lets me know everything’s all right
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowin’ through the jasmine in my mind
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowin’ though the jasmine in my mind
See the paper layin’ on the sidewalk
A little music from the house next door
So I walk on up to the doorstep
Through the screen and across the floor
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowin’ through the jasmine in my mind
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowin’ through the jasmine in my mind
Sweet days of summer, the jasmine’s in bloom
July is dressed up and playing her tune
And I come home from a hard day’s work
And you’re waitin’ there
Not a care in the world
See the smile awaitin’ in the kitchen
Through cookin’ and the plates for two
Feel the arms that reach out to hold me
In the evening when the day is through
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowing through the jasmine in my mind
Summer breeze makes me feel fine
Blowing through the jasmine in my mind
“East Of Ginger Trees”
Go east of your dream and farm. Let peace and silence spin your yarn.
What harm can befall thee in yon wilderness of clove?
Go on east of ginger trees. Go soft and silent like the breeze.
With ease be off and wander in yon wilderness of clove.
Go on past the goldenrods, where fools and angels lose their odds.
And gods of our ancestors did immerse themselves in clove.
Go on toward the crimson shore, beyond this life of metaphors.
Where doors of understanding’s house decorates he them with clove.
“Be lions roaring in the forests of knowledge,
Whales swimming in the oceans of life.”
Prepare to meet Bahá’u’llá’h in the Garden of Clove.
