3 Autumn-Related Songs For Those Wishing Fall Would Just Get Here Already

While Labor Day marks the unofficial end of summer, the blazing temperatures outside are a scorching reminder that summer, indeed, continues. So as we try to beat the heat until fall’s cooling arrival, here are three autumn-related songs for those wishing sweater weather gets here sooner rather than later.  

“Dead Leaves And The Dirty Ground” by The White Stripes

“Well, any man with a microphone can tell you what he loves the most,” Jack White sings on this bluesy banger from 2001. The title describes a wilted scene when the narrator’s lover isn’t around. But it’s all “shiny tops and soda pops” when his partner speaks. So White has made a good living writing epic riffs, but they always feel better when anchored by Meg White’s modest stomp. The track opens White Blood Cells, an album that landed like a much-needed mutiny against early-aughts modern rock.

“Sweater Weather” by The Neighbourhood

Here, Jesse Rutherford narrates his band’s flirty hit about daydreams and romantic ambitions. “Sweater Weather” became a hit for California alternative rock band The Neighbourhood in 2013. However, in 2020, it went viral and found new life on TikTok. Perhaps a song about a tryst on the beach helped the world escape feeling pent up during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Use the sleeves on my sweater, let’s have an adventure,
Head in the clouds, but my gravity’s centered.
Touch my neck, and I’ll touch yours,
You in those little high-waisted shorts, oh.

“Autumn Sweater” by Yo La Tengo

From Yo La Tengo’s 1997 masterpiece, I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One, Ira Kaplan wants to duck out with a romantic partner. Leave the crowd and the chaos behind. Kind of like this oppressive heat wave most of us are experiencing. We’d rather be cozy in autumn sweaters, staring at the dead leaves, marveling at fall’s colors. Yo La Tengo’s hypnotic track echoes the dizzying nervousness of falling in love—the excitement, awkwardness, and butterflies of a new entanglement.

We could slip away,
Wouldn’t that be better?
Me with nothing to say,
And you in your autumn sweater.

Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images