Only one more week until Christmas Eve, y’all. I’ll be off to see MamaDork in just a few days, most of my shopping is done, I’ve been tearing it up in the kitchen, and our CD changer has been working overtime.
I have a very strict rule about waiting until after Thanksgiving before the Xmas music makes its appearance in my house. But when it’s time, I’m ready, and I always like re-discovering my favorites. We have quite an eclectic collection, ranging from the Robert Shaw Chorale to John Denver & the Muppets to El Vez to obscure blues tracks. We don’t have a lot of pop artists’ holiday albums, maybe because the Dude is scarred from listening to Christmas with Perry Como throughout his childhood, but we hear that stuff when we go shopping. (And man, the first time of the season I hear WHAM!’s “Last Christmas” is a special day.)
It’s hard to pick my favorites, but I grew up listening to a lot of old fashioned, sacred carols in big choral arrangements, and even though I’m a big old atheist, I love them, especially the melancholy ones. My favorites are probably “In the Bleak Midwinter,” “Coventry Carol” and then “My Dancing Day,” although I’m very particular about arrangements and couldn’t find my favorite for the latter on YouTube, so no link.
I like contemporary stuff, too, but do not play “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” in my presence if you want to keep all your limbs. Or “Jingle Bell Rock.” Stabby. I also don’t like Vince Guaraldi, but I know that’s possibly illegal.
So, this week is about your favorite–and least favorite–holiday songs. Sacred or secular, classical or pop. What can’t you wait to hear when the season rolls around? Which tunes make you want to pull our your Reindeer Slayer 2000?
Super bonus, even though Hanukkah is over: The Maccabeats, bein’ all cute and musical and Jewish-collegiate.
Oh good, a Jew is responding first.
I like a lot of Christmas music, actually. How can you beat the Hallelujah Chorus? Anything medieval is good with me. I just don’t worry about the lyrics, a skill I developed as a kid when singing in Christmas assemblies at grade school. Back then no one worried about our sensibilities, and we all learned not to sing certain words and phrases. And no, throwing in the Dreidel Song doesn’t make it multicultural, peeps.
Anyhow…as an adult, I worked retail and learned to loathe quite a number of Christmas pop songs. Dean Martin, George Michael, Brenda Lee-migraine material. But I can listen to Bruce sing “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” and “Merry Christmas, Baby” all year!
My current black humor faves are “Chipmunks Roasting on an Open Fire” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3M7IR6jkpc and the Decemberists’ “Please, Daddy, Don’t Get Drunk On Christmas” (sorry, no link for that one).
Best wishes for a very happy Christmas to all of you who observe it!
Favorite song – Last Christmas by Wham! I have George Michael’s greatest hits and it’s on there, so i get to hear it year round! There’s also Transsiberian Orchestra, always awesome.
Best album EVAR – Barenaked for the Holidays. Good versions of old classics, good original songs, four, count ‘em, FOUR, Hanukkah songs, and the Happy Birthday song sung to Jesus!
It pretty much doesn’t leave the CD changer all season long.
Least Favorite Song: The Christmas Shoes. Makes me want to throw the radio out of the car, run it over, and then maybe blow it up.
‘Dancing Day’ was my school carol, along with the Gardner arrangement of ‘The Holly and the Ivy’ (chorus to be sung in a three-part round, with actions) so I always get a rush of nostalgia from those. Howell’s ‘Spotless rose’ and the old carol ‘Gaudete’ are both amazing, and for a weidly melancholy congregational carol you can’t beat ‘O come o come Emmanuel’. Or anything with a descant! Love a bit of a descant. Just got back from a college chapel choir trip to Krakow, lots of singing carols in the snow in the town square, now I’m addicted…
Can’t believe I forgot Tavener’s the Lamb! Totally haunting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Rb2eksiuDw
Tchaikovsky the Nutcracker suite. Hands down absolute best. Nobody does a melody like him. Can I be a little OT and say that I love any of the Russian 5 – all of them, all of it?
As for worst, if it doesn’t come up to the level of Bach or the 5, maybe I liked it once. But if I have heard it more than 100 times, well, I pretty much hate it now.
Current Favorite: “Five Pound Box of Money”. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOQ0oJfsz58&feature=related
“Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer” has me running for my bitchzooka. It’s just…stupid. And not funny.
Eartha Kitt’s version of “Santa Baby” is the only one I can tolerate.
The Christmas carols I love are the old-school church-y ones: “O Come All Ye Faithful”, “Gloria in Excelsis Deo”, “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” My grandpa sang in the church choir, so I’m really partial to the classics I used to hear him sing at Christmas Eve services.
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“Dick in a Box” – hands down.
Ok – not really.
In complete contrast to typical AmBam, I’m quite the sucker for “country christmas” things. I like many of those cheesy spoken word things where some heartbreaking (and eventually heartwarming) story is told over traditional music. The only pop holiday songs produced in my lifetime that I can stand are country music based. This includes (sorry, BSharper)”Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer.”
I have developed quite a fondness for the Dean Martin, Como, etc christmas tunes after spending two months working on “Forever Plaid: Plaid Tidings.”
In general, my taste is best summed up as “5th Grade Christmas Concert material.” Rudolph, Frosty, Three Kings, Jingle Bells, etc. My secular heart is still warmed by Hark the Herald Angels and Come All Ye Faithful – but usually religious christmas songs bore me very quickly.
At this point, I am over Christmas music. In fact, I am so over Christmas music that I find I am over both Christmas and music as well. About the only thing I can tolerate on my ipod at the current time is Scandanavian death metal.
I forgot my rage-makers: I get violent when I hear WHAM’s “Last Christmas” – I hate that song soooo much and it’s like 7 minutes long or something.
Also – Transiberian Orchestra. I was never a fan, but then I spent a week snowed in with an ex’s family and that was the only cd they would play.
I sung in a choir for most of my life, though not for a few years now, so I pretty much know every lyric to every traditional Christmas song and carol ever written.
I’m with you, PhDork, in that I am very picky about particular arrangements. But now I have “My Dancing Day” in my head so I’m happy.
“Santa Baby” is probably my favourite pop song, but only sung by Eartha Kitt. In fact her entire Christmas album is really my favourite in general.
Usually, I’m all about the Christmas music, but I haven’t been feeling it this year. This could be related to the undecorated fake tree in the corner of my living room and the fact that I’ve had the flu for 2 weeks now.
Still, I’m obsessed with Jackson Browne’s “The Rebel Jesus.” I also have a strange thing for Harry Connick Jr.’s “I Pray on Christmas.”
Songs I hate, like, will run away from them in order to avoid: “The Little Drummer Boy” and “The Christmas Shoes.”
My parents have a CD of Kings College Choir, which I consider definitive Christmas music.
Rudolph and Frosty the Snowman make me stabbity.
I’m a sucker for old-school Christmas carols – God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Silent Night, Adeste Fideles (yes, I prefer the Latin version). I also really like the Carol of the Bells and of course also the Nutcracker suite. My mother has a CD of Bing Crosby singing a lot of classic songs and I think it’s great, his voice is just somehow made for that kind of thing.
I’m not a huge fan of pop Christmas songs, although I do love ‘Happy Christmas (War is Over)’ and ‘Do They Know it’s Christmastime’.
The Germans have some really good ones too – ‘O Tannenbaum’ and ‘O du fröhliche’ are my favourites.
I can’t stand, however, ‘Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer’, that stupid Chipmunks song, or ‘I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus’.
I actually rather like ‘Last Christmas’ but ever since someone pointed out to me that he always says ‘I gev you my heart’ rather than ‘I gave you my heart’ I can’t hear it without noticing that every. single. time.
Um, this is a little embarrassing, but I like Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You” because it was in Love Actually and I adore that movie.
I dislike Silent Night because I thought it was really pretty when I was little and then I learned it was all about Jesus and that made me uncomfortable. :-/
My favorite albums are “Our Heart’s Joy” by Chanticleer and “Ella Wishes You a Swingin’ Christmas.”
My biggest hate is Paul McCartney’s “Wonderful Christmastime.” It’s such a horrific earworm that I have to plug my ears and run out of the store if they play it.
For pop songs, nothing beats Richard Cheese’s “Jingle Bells.” http://amzn.to/ejGCCl
Anyone know Lyle Lovett’s song “Christmas Morning”?
Yay for “Love Actually”! I’ve been looking for it on tv.
Gen, I think we are music-twins. Love Chanticleer (and a friend of mine from undergrad used to sing with them, which qualifies as “rock star” in this dork’s book), and that Ella disc is solid, front to back.
And you are SO right about “Wonderful Christmastime.” I think it might be The Worst Holiday Song Ever. Paul on his own is generally ugh, but he outdoes himself in crapitude on that one. Unlike Lennon, whose “Happy Christmas (War is Over)” I just heard and loved all over again.
Catalania–thanks for the reminders re: Gaudete and The Holly and the Ivy. I don’t know The Lamb; I’ll have to check that out. Go, choir nerds!!!
Dillene–I will get to that point soon. Xmas music goes away no later than the 28th. For you: Lordi’s Hardrock Hallelujah.
Although I have heard of it, and read the lyrics, I have never actually heard that horrible “Christmas Shoes” song–that’s the one with the little kid paying in small change for shoes for his dead mom, right? Festive!
Another favorite: Lo, How A Rose E’er Blooming.
I love “Love Actually” too!
If you really love Christmas…come on and let it snow…
We are sad in my house so we play the Phil Spector Christmas album (although actually we haven’t done that since the whole murder thing but we used to mainly for Darlene Love, who I love) but mainly we play Johnny Cash and Irish rebel songs. They are not Christmassy I know but they are what I grew up with.
I’m also a sucker for a bit of Dean Martin at Christmas and Sinatra and also Bobby Womack’s christmas hits (yes, really, cheesetastic) and I secretly love the little drummer boy because i have no taste.
Other than that a lot of Nutcracker, occasionally the Messiah, carols particularly Adeste Fideles, The Holly and The Ivy and God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, I’m an equal opportunities Christmas music abuser.
With two exceptions. Sorry everyone but I hate, hate, hate Last Christmas and I loathe Love Actually, which i just think is a big pile of stinky smug ersatz crap like just about anything with Hugh Grant in and everything written by Richard Curtis who I think might be the most evil man in the UK alive today.
Hands down, my favorite Christmas CD is Brian Setzer’s Boogie Woogie Christmas. Favorite song on it (aka biggest ear worm on it) is “(Everybody’s Waitin’ For) The Man With the Bag”. Also, he was nominated for a Grammy for The Nutcracker Suite on that CD. Love it!
@emilyanne: Bah humbug!
Did you know that John Waters – yes, THAT John Waters, of Pink Flamingos fame – did a Christmas album a few years ago? Sooooooooo many fun songs on it! Totally worth a purchase. Here’s a sample from YouTube: (These two just make me so happy. They’re what I think of now when I think of Christmas!)
Christmas Time is Coming (A Street Carol) by Stormy Weather
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xHtwsiZqws
I Wish You a Merry Christmas by Big Dee Irwin and Little Eva
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7R7ViWzXww
PhDork, you are my long-lost Christmas music taste twin.
@Becky – I know but how would you feel if a director consistently made movies portraying New York as only populated by white upper class ditherers and every one lapped it up as wonderful.
Ooh! Ooh! I remembered another favorite! “Tis the Season for Los Straitjackets.” Basically it’s the surf-guitar version of a lot of Xmas tunes. Great for dancing.
@emilyanne: Wait, you mean Alan Rickman isn’t really the PM’s brother-in-law?
I really like Fairytale of New York, but that’s just me. I also like this really obscure song called “Jesus was a Long-Haired Radical Socialist Jew”.
Basically, I enjoy more upbeat Christmas tunes that don’t overdo the miasma.
Oh, and speaking of Christmas songs:
http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/thedudette/nostalgia-chick/3250-top-10-disturbing-and-inescapable-christmas-songs
@MM – hah. but seriously I just think he peddles a thoroughly irritating ersatz vision of England entirely aimed at pleasing Americans and I just can’t watch a Curtis film without cringing and/or throwing things at the screen
Growing up we had the nutcracker suite, and the Russian 5, Gloria in excelsis deo etc, and other traditional hymns. And thanks to that introduction for Christmas music, I really can’t do any of it – no jingle bells, etc. And I think the most “modern” of the household christmas music was “Good King Wenceslas” (and the thing I like best about it now, was that it isn’t about the 25th Dec, but the 26th Dec – the St Stephen’s feast day, and the day to give alms). I walk out of shops with christmas music in them – for some reason it just grates.
Some friends in lieu of cards do a christmas mixed tape/cd filled with even more modern music (like the decemberists and the ramones et al). I enjoy receiving my friends christmas “cards”, and will listen to them once, and only once.
However there was one even more modern christmas album that I don’t mind being played twice, it’s twisted sister’s “twisted christmas”, and all to the tune of their mega hit way back when it was all about hair metal and men wearing outlandish lycra that would put Jane Fonda to shame.
The gender politics is aweful in this film clip (I tried to find a less offensive film clip, but the media wasn’t available in my country via youtube), but please enjoy twisted sister’s “Oh come oh ye Faithful”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=De47fjH6RKY
I like The Messiah and The Nutcracker a lot. Choral stuff is generally good. And I love the album A Motown Christmas Carol since it makes me think of childhood.
The absolute rock-bottom worst for me is Celine Dion’s Christmas album, which my mother loves and which has in the past led me to barricade myself in my room blasting Sonic Youth to combat the shrieking. Also, I used to like “Do They Know It’s Christmas” a lot when I was younger, but now that I’m a social justice activist it really reeks of backpat-activism and unchecked privilege…even Bob Geldof’s tendencies toward black humor can’t redeem lyrics like “Well, tonight thank god it’s them instead of you” and “There won’t be snow in Africa this Christmastime/The greatest gift they’ll get this year is life,” as if it’s the Westerners who are keeping them alive. Criiiiiinge.
I grew up listening to the Ray Conniff Singers Christmas albums, and it’s still not Christmas without them. I’m not a huge fan of the newer pop stuff, but I do like that “baby please don’t go” song by U2 (I don’t know the real title and am too lazy to google).
I’m another Wonderful Christmastime hater. Worst. Christmas. Song. Ever.
Cat – I feel the same way about Do They Know It’s Christmas Time. I used to love it, but it came on the radio the other day and I cringed and had to turn the station.
Cat – I am so with you on Do They Know It’s Christmas Time – it actually has the second worst lyrics of any song ever written (in case any one wondered the worst lyrics of all time are from Pink Floyd’s Falklands War Concept Album (yes, really) The Final Cut and are from the song The Post-War Dream, google them and you will see what I mean).
ps my favourite bad bit of Do They Know It’s Christmas – when Sting and Simon Le Bon earnestly sing: “And it’s a world of dreaded fear
Where the only water flowing is a bitter sting of tears
And the christmas bells that ring there are the clanging chimes of doom.”
Yay the clanging chimes of doom, how much more smugly patronising can one bunch of musicians get. At least We Are The World while crap is just treacly rubbish.
I play and write piano music every chance I get, and Vince Guaraldi is one of my musical heroes.
I think a lot of people would judge me if they knew I absolutely loved Gary Hoey’s arrangements of Christmas songs.
I guess I’m a sucker for instrumental music.