In the Summertime

Mungo Jerry

Mungo Jerry is a British rock group whose greatest success was in the early 1970s, though they have continued throughout the years with an ever-changing line-up, always fronted by Ray Dorset. They are remembered above all for their hit "In the Summertime". It remains their most successful and most instantly recognisable song, and their only hit outside of the UK. Their name was inspired by the poem "Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer", from T. S. Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. According to Joseph Murrell's The Book of Golden Discs (1978), "Mungomania" was possibly the most startling and unpredicted pop phenomenon to hit Britain since The Beatles. more »