Some songs don’t just age—they linger. Summer of Breaking Up by Teenage Girls isn’t just another entry in the breakup song canon. It’s a time capsule with teeth. Written and performed by the band under their original name, the version now streaming was recorded during a brief rebrand as Strange Temptations—but make no mistake, this is pure Teenage Girls DNA.

From the opening line—“This is the summer of breaking up”—you’re dropped into something raw, vivid, and deeply personal. Lines like “Find a razor blade and the courage to finish it” aren’t shock value—they’re emotional gut punches, scribbled in the margins of a teenage diary soaked with truth. The guitars don’t soothe. They scrape and seethe, surging like a memory you can’t outrun.

Produced by Jawbox’s J. Robbins at Baltimore’s Magpie Cage studio, the track blends lo-fi urgency with razor-sharp precision. The chorus pulses like a compulsion, while a half-time breakdown (“Somebody please help me”) descends into layered chaos that would make Sunny Day Real Estate proud. This isn’t just nostalgia—it’s a perfectly controlled freefall.

There’s a bite of The Smiths in the lyrical wit and a touch of Morrissey’s bitter charm in the delivery—only sharpened with more distortion and none of the smugness. Lines like “vile boys doing their best to be like me” drip with irony, while still aching with vulnerability. Teenage Girls manage what few bands can: total sincerity without slipping into sentimentality.

And while Gen Z listeners may stumble on this track and label it “vintage,” it couldn’t be more present. Summer of Breaking Up doesn’t beg to be understood—it dares you to feel it. Loud. Unfiltered. Unapologetically messy.

As the band teases new projects and rumored solo work, this song stands like a burning letter you were never meant to reread. It’s not polished. It’s not perfect. That’s the point.

Crank it up. Let it ruin you a little. Summer of Breaking Up is streaming now.