Tear-jerking summer classics: recommended popular songs

Writing down the summerrokudenashi

Writing down the summer

A song carefully woven like writing a diary entry about an ordinary summer day.

Scenes come to life—the flowers blooming by the roadside, the fireworks rising over the neighboring town’s sky—stirring both tenderness for the shining season and a looming sense of its eventual end.

The appeal also lies in vocalist Ninjin’s steady, resonant voice and the nostalgic rock sound.

Featured on the EP “Hikage,” released in July 2025, this track is a work that will stay by your side throughout your summer.

A midsummer passing showerUtada Hikaru

Hikaru Utada – Midsummer Shower

A fantastical, emotionally stirring song powerfully sung by Hikaru Utada.

It’s a ballad centered on piano and strings, with a somewhat dark atmosphere that leaves a strong impression.

Starting almost like a simple piano-and-voice performance, it grows grander as the strings come in, conveying a sense of emotions swelling and expanding.

Said to be a song that puts into words the feelings of losing someone precious, it resonates with a striking instability, as if raw, unprocessed emotions are being laid bare.

The instability in both the sound and the lyrics comes through directly, making it a piece that deeply shakes the listener’s heart.

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OathBEGIN

BEGIN / Oath

With its beautiful piano melody and powerful vocals, this uplifting anthem fuels the resolve to face any hardship.

Even when you feel discouraged by a horizon that seems to recede no matter how far you walk, it conveys in straightforward words the importance of never giving up and continuing toward tomorrow.

Released in August 2004 as a single by BEGIN, the song was used as the ending theme for the summer tradition “Netto Koshien.” If you’re hitting walls on the path to your goal and feel your spirit wavering, this is the song you need to hear.

Listen, and you’ll find yourself thinking, “I’ll give it one more try,” ready to look ahead and take a strong step forward.

Lamp starharuka nakamura + suis from Yorushika

[MV] Akari-boshi (Lamp Star) / haruka nakamura + suis from Yorushika

You’re drawn into its delicate, lyrical sound.

It’s a collaboration between composer haruka nakamura and suis, the vocalist of Yorushika.

The song was written as the theme for the film “Kono Natsu no Hoshi o Miru,” set to be released in July 2025.

suis’s crystalline voice gently accompanies the quiet, beautiful piano melodies woven by haruka nakamura, creating an immersive feeling as if you were inside a planetarium.

The story—tinged with the ache of an irretrievable past and the discovery of a small light of hope in the darkness—perfectly matches the film’s worldview.

Listen, and you’ll find yourself forgetting the daily bustle and quietly looking up at the night sky.

Marigoldaimyon

Aimyon – Marigold [OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO]

It’s a masterpiece that fully showcases Aimyon’s exceptional songwriting, vividly conjuring a scene where wistfulness and warmth coexist—like a summer evening at dusk.

Featuring a memorable acoustic guitar tone, the song beautifully captures the brilliance of love along with the faint anxiety it carries and a nostalgia for time slipping away.

Released in August 2018 as her fifth single, it went on to become the first track by a domestic artist to surpass 100 million streams in 2019.

It’s the kind of song that sinks deep into your heart when you want to bathe in that indescribable melancholy at summer’s end or quietly reflect on your relationship with someone important.

Only for you, clear skiesYorushika

Yorushika – Just Clear Skies for You (MUSIC VIDEO)

It’s a track whose fresh yet somehow wistful melody hits you in the chest, like a flashback to summer days gone by.

Created by the unit Yorushika—composer n-buna and vocalist suis—the song portrays the brilliance of youth and the bittersweet sense of loss that comes with growing up, using literary lyrics that feel as if you’re reading a short story.

The protagonist’s pent-up feelings left unsaid and the fading memories they confront are rendered with delicate nuance through suis’s clear, pure vocals.

This piece is included on Yorushika’s May 2018 mini-album “No Encore for the Lonely Loser,” and its uniquely animated music video, directed by Waboku, further accentuates the song’s world.

On streaming platforms, it surpassed 300 million plays in October 2023, showing just how deeply it resonates with many listeners.

In December 2019, it was also used as background music for the opening visuals of a live show by the comedy duo “Tarinai Futari.” Listen to it on a slightly lonely late-summer evening, or when you find yourself reminiscing and feeling sentimental, and its poignant charm may sink even deeper into your heart.

NatsuneYuuri

Natsune

It’s a delicate melody that seems to express, in music, that somewhat wistful tone you hear as summer draws to a close—simply wonderful.

Yuri’s emotionally rich voice beautifully conveys the lingering attachment to a fading season and the aching wish to spend just a little more time with someone dear.

This work is a rock ballad that sinks deeply into the listener’s heart.

Released in September 2021, it memorably colored the ending of episode 1 of the Hulu original drama “Dry Flower – July’s Room -,” which shares the worldview of one of Yuri’s signature songs.

Its popularity is evident from its peak at No.

23 on the Billboard JAPAN Hot 100.

This gem is also included on the acclaimed album “Ichi.” It’s a masterpiece you’ll want to hear on a quiet night after summer’s clamor has passed, when you feel a sudden loneliness, or when you wish to etch an irreplaceable, beautiful moment into your heart.