If songs about growing up teach us anything, it’s that adolescence never really ends. Musicians love the subject, often returning to it multiple times – to look back on childhood, reflecting on teenage years, or simply on the process of getting older. There’s a wealth of wit and wisdom about the ageing process in music – here’s 50 songs about growing up to guide you through the sometimes painful process…
1. ‘1979’ – Smashing Pumpkins
Key lyrics: “June bug skipping like a stone / With the headlights pointed at the dawn / We were sure we’d never see an end to it all”
What it encapsulates: The nostalgia you never realise you’ll feel for your adolescence.
2. ‘West Coast’ – Fidlar
Key lyrics: “All my friends they just stay the same / I’m growing up but nothing’s changing / I’m so sick of this stupid place / It’s so suburban and so boring”
What it encapsulates: That restless suburban adolescent itch.
3. ‘Dammit’ – Blink-182
Key lyrics: “Everybody’s gone / And I’ve been here for too long / To face this on my own / Well, I guess this is growing up”
What it encapsulates: Realising you’re a bit of a fuck-up.
4. ‘Time’ – Pink Floyd
Key lyrics: “One day you find ten years have got behind you / No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun”
What it encapsulates: Realising time moves faster when you’re older.
5. ‘Growing Pains’ – Ludacris
Key lyrics: “Wanna hang with the big boys and play with the big toys / And be with the people making all that goddamn noise”
What it encapsulates: Wanting to get older, and not realising what you’ll lose in the process.
6. ‘Grown Up’ – Danny Brown
Key lyrics: “Remember back then we thought we growed up / Rushing as a kid just to be grown up”
What it encapsulates: That bit of youth when you’re happy not to be ID’d.
7. ‘In My Life’ – The Beatles
Key lyrics: “I know I’ll never lose affection / For people and things that went before / I know I’ll often stop and think about them”
What it encapsulates: The people you get to know as you grow older.
8. ‘We’re Going To Be Friends’ – The White Stripes
Key lyrics: “When I wake tomorrow I’ll bet / that you and I will walk together again / I can tell that we are gonna be friends”
What it encapsulates: Those friends you keep your whole life – and the ones you only think you will.
9.‘Ivy’ – Frank Ocean
Key lyrics: “You ain’t a kid no more / We’ll never be those kids again”
What it encapsulates: Memories, man. Memories.
Frank doesn’t put his stuff on YouTube any more so please enjoy this cover version by Alessia Cara:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ah9ydcv6kJw
10. ‘Changes’ – David Bowie
Key lyrics: “Just gonna have to be a different man / Time may change me / But I can’t trace time”
What it encapsulates: Being a work in progress, whether or not you acknowledge it.
11. ‘Winter’ – Tori Amos
Key lyrics: “‘Mirror mirror, where’s the crystal palace?’ / But I only can see myself / Skating around the truth who I am / But I know that the ice is getting thin”
What it encapsulates: The end of childish imagination, and the beginning of adolescent confusion.
12. ‘Opposite Of Adults’ – Chiddy Bang
Key lyrics: “Tell mummy I’m sorry, this life is a party, I’m never growing up”
What it encapsulates: Giving adulthood the finger.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ep1ilHpTvSM
13. ‘Growin’ Up’ – Bruce Springsteen
Key lyrics: “I hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd / But when they said, ‘Sit down’, I stood up / Ooh… growin’ up”
What it encapsulates: Pretty much what it says on the tin.
14. ‘Fade Away’ – Oasis
Key lyrics: “While we’re living / the dreams we have as children / Fade away”
What it encapsulates: Realising that life is hard and things don’t always turn out the way you wanted.
15. ‘Class of 2013’ – Mitski
Key lyrics: “Mom, am I still young? Can I dream for a few months more?”
What it encapsulates: When you go back to a parent’s house to pretend you have 0 responsibilities.
16. ‘Same Drugs’ – Chance The Rapper
Key lyrics: “Window closed, Wendy got old / I was too late, I was too late / A shadow of what I once was”
What it encapsulates: Seeing an old friend who’s fucked up.
17. ‘17’ – Youth Lagoon
Key lyrics: “When I was seventeen / My mother said to me / ‘Don’t stop imagining. The day that you do is the day that you die‘”
What it encapsulates: The importance of retaining aspects of childhood.
18. ‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’ – The Verve
Key lyrics: “No change / I can’t change / But I’m here in my mould”
What it encapsulates: Growing up and finding yourself stuck in a groove 🙁
19. ‘Ghost!’ – Kid Cudi
Key lyrics: “I want to know one thing, when did I become a ghost?”
What it encapsulates: Realising you took a wrong turn five years ago. At least you realised though, right?
20. ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ – The Beatles
Key lyrics: “Nothing is real / And nothing to get hung about / Strawberry Fields forever”
What it encapsulates: The weird potency of childhood memories, with a little help from LSD.
21. ‘Momma’s Place’ – Roisin Murphy
Key lyrics: “Do you think you invented being bad?”
What it encapsulates: When you’re old enough to hear your parents’ stories and they’re better than yours.
22. ‘Song 4 Mutya’ – Groove Armada ft. Mutya Buena
Key lyrics: “Don’t react now, you can’t go back now”
What it encapsulates: A break-up, but also realising you’re a bigger person than you used to be.
23. ‘Time To Pretend’ – MGMT
Key lyrics: “Yeah it’s overwhelming, but what else can we do? Get jobs in offices and wake up for the morning commute?”
What it encapsulates: Growing up to the point where you acknowledge the world is bullshit, and therefore refuse to play by its rules. For a bit.
24. ‘Good Riddance’ – Green Day
Key lyrics: “Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go / So make the best of this test, and don’t ask why”
What it encapsulates: A break-up, but also coming to know that life is unpredictable.
25. ‘All My Rage’
Key lyrics: “All my rage been gone / I leave my rage to the sea and the sun”
What it encapsulates: Leaving teenage rage behind. Marling herself calls it “a bit of fun… about taking it all on the chin.”
26. ‘Coming of Age’ – Julia Jacklin
Key lyrics: “I had a life in my head / I’d be pushing up that hill until those toes bled / Now I gotta learn this new stage / Didn’t see it coming / My coming of age”
What it encapsulates: Getting there, and wondering why things aren’t quite so hard any more.
27. ‘Forever Young’ – Bob Dylan
Key lyrics: “Stand upright and be strong / May you stay forever young”
What it encapsulates: The importance of holding on to the bits of youth that matter.
28. ‘Why Does It Always Rain On Me’ – Travis
Key lyrics: “I’m seeing a tunnel at the end of all these lights”
What it encapsulates: The repercussions of that lie you told when you were 17? C’mon, grow up.
29. ‘Landslide’ – Fleetwood Mac
Key lyrics: “Time makes you bolder / Even children get older / I’m getting older too”
What it encapsulates: Change.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_PQ4fRQ5Kc
30. ‘The Suburbs’ – Arcade Fire
Key lyrics: “Can you understand why I want a daughter while I’m still young? / I want to hold her hand and show her some beauty before this damage is done”
What it encapsulates: The realisation of what your children will go through.
31. ‘Montezuma’ – Fleet Foxes
Key lyrics: “Now I am older than my mother and father when they had their daughter – now what does that say about me?”
What it encapsulates: Comparing your life progression to your parents’. Or to other people’s – like David Bowie’s, for example.
32. ‘Both Sides Now’ – Joni Mitchell
Key lyrics: “I’ve looked at life from both sides now / From win and lose and still somehow it’s life’s illusions I recall / I really don’t know life at all”
What it encapsulates: Wisdom/epiphanies/truth/the greatness of Joni Mitchell.
33. ‘The Man With The Child In His Eyes’ – Kate Bush
Key lyrics: “He’s here again / the man with the child in his eyes”
What it encapsulates: A youthful spirit never goes away – it’s just not always immediately obvious.
34. ‘December 4th’ – Jay Z
Key lyrics: “I pray I’m forgiven / For every bad decision I made, every sister I played / ‘Cause I’m still paranoid to this day”
What it encapsulates: This song is essentially Jay’s autobiography: it’s about his whole life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cbkD6RWdKk
35. ‘Breed’ – Nirvana
Key lyrics: “Get away, get away, get away / Get away, away, away from your home”
What it encapsulates: Getting old enough to reject everything you see.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teetvAUcG_E
36. ‘No Matter Where We Go’ – Whitney
Key lyrics: “I wanna take you out / I wanna drive around / With you with the windows down / And we can run all night”
What it encapsulates: Being young and wild and free, man. The perfect age.
37. ‘Coming of Age’ – Foster The People
Key lyrics: “Even when I’m wrong I tend to think I’m right / Well I’m bored of the game / And too tired to rage”
What it encapsulates: Looking at yourself after a while and not really liking who you’ve become.
38. ‘Depreston’ – Courtney Barnett
Key lyrics: “You said we should look out further / I guess it wouldn’t hurt us”
What it encapsulates: Getting older and moving to the ‘burbs. And spying at open houses. And how awful estate agents are. And mortality. That too.
39. ‘Bros’ – Wolf Alice
Key lyrics: “Remember when we cut our hair? / We both looked like boys but we didn’t care / Stick it out together, like we always do”
What it encapsulates: Friendship that lasts.
40. ‘Sticks and Stones’ – Jamie T
Key lyrics: “When there’s no one left to fight / Boys like us don’t shine so bright”
What it encapsulates: The people adulthood doesn’t suit.
41. ‘Losing My Edge’ – LCD Soundsystem
Key lyrics: “I’m losing my edge / The kids are coming up from behind”
What it encapsulates: Getting old(er).
42. ‘Expectations’ – Belle & Sebastian
Key lyrics: “Tell Veronica the secret of the boy you never kissed/ she’s got everything to gain ’cause she’s a fat girl with a lisp”
What it encapsulates: How tough it is being at school
43. ‘Disco 2000’ – Pulp
Key lyrics: “I never knew that you’d get married / I would be living down here on my own / On that damp and lonely Thursday years ago”
What it encapsulates: The whole future being ahead of you – and the point when it isn’t any more.
44. ‘When I Was A Boy’ – ELO
Key lyrics: “When I was a boy, I had a dream”
What it encapsulates: Youthful drive – and less obviously, the loss of it.
45. ‘In My Room’ – The Beach Boys
Key lyrics: “In my room / Do my dreaming and my scheming lie awake and pray / Do my crying and my sighing laugh at yesterday / Now it’s dark and I’m alone / But I won’t be afraid / In my room”
What it encapsulates: Locking yourself in your room as a teen.
46. ‘Grew Up at Midnight’ – The Maccabees
Key lyrics: “We grew up at midnight / We were only kids then / but that night we knew”
What it encapsulates: The moment. You know the one.
47. ‘Seasons (Waiting On You)’ – Future Islands
Key lyrics: “When people change / They gain a piece, but they lose one too”
What it encapsulates: Irreversible change.
48. ‘Mistaken For Strangers’ – The National
Key lyrics: “You get mistaken for strangers by your own friends / When you pass them at night”
What it encapsulates: A proper ‘yikes’ moment: not being recognised by your old friends.
49. ‘Station Approach’ – Elbow
Key lyrics: “Coming home I feel like I designed these buildings I walk by”
What it encapsulates: The nostalgic clout of places from your youth.
50. ‘Teenage Talk’ – St Vincent
Key lyrics: “How do you see me now, now that I’m a little bit older, older? Never mind the albatross smouldering on my shoulder”
What it encapsulates: The insignificance of teenage problems versus adult ones.