It’s been a week since the election debacle, and millions of us are feeling sad and hopeless about the coming nightmare, but I am not going to let these fascist clods ruin the holidays. So today, I want to write about something less serious and more fun.
In my younger and less vulnerable years, I was a performative grouch about Christmas music and movies. Never before Dec. 1, I insisted. Eventually, that threshold relaxed to the weekend after Thanksgiving, and then Black Friday.
Now, when the calendar rolls over to Nov. 1, the Halloween stuff goes back into the basement, and I morph into a middle-aged stevedore to haul the thirty-some boxes of Christmas decorations and an enormous tree upstairs to make the house look like Home Goods vomited up the green and red holiday spirit.
I’m older and life isn’t so limitless and is filled with aches, pains, and genuine irredeemable Grinches and Scrooges, so I want joy and cheer where I can get it. Acting peevish about a holiday season is silly.
In the days leading up to Nov. 1, I begin to search online for when SiriusXM begins its holiday channels. I reprogram three pre-sets to Holly (Ch. 78), Holiday Traditions (Ch. 71), and Hallmark Radio (Ch. 105). There are a couple dozen more you can stream via the SiriusXM app. Because I am old and have suffered a half dozen concussions, my Swiss cheese brain requires me to take a photo of the original station pre-sets because I’ll otherwise never remember what they were when Jan. 1 rolls around.
My musical tastes in general tend toward classic rock, thanks to being born in 1974 and having an older brother and sister that blasted stuff like Queen, the Rolling Stones, Bowie, J. Geils, Billy Joel, etc. And I’m a geek about Steely Dan and Jimmy Buffett. Sure, there’s current stuff I enjoy, but my tastes are my tastes.
When it comes to Christmas music, I give it wide latitude. I have a substantial tolerance for holiday songs that I would not in any other genre. Part of that is my deep strain of nostalgia: Christmastime, for me, stirs some of my best memories, of when all my family was alive and together for big gatherings and meals. That’s now almost forty years in the past and many of those people are only memories now. And I don’t mind goofy, silly, treacly holiday music because it’s the one season I’m in a sentimental good mood, and most other people are less shitty for a few weeks. So yeah, I’ll smile and bop along in the car to “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer” (but only a few times; let’s not push it).
I’m a Hitchens-style atheist, a card-carrying degenerate libertine, and decadent bohemian, meaning that I celebrate the holiday closer to its Yule and to its Roman pagan origins — Saturnalia. But I don’t mind the traditional Christian religious music around the holiday even if I don’t buy into the specific commercialized mythology. I mean, Handel’s “Messiah” is a jam.
Anyways, here’s a brief list of my favorite Christmas tunes. This changes slightly each season but these are currently the most-played songs from my 79-song YouTube Music Christmas playlist, which you can find here.
“Christmas Vacation” by Mavis Staples. This is the song during the opening credits of 1989’s “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.” This is the only movie of which I can quote every line, and I need you dickheads to stop half-assing it: Cousin Eddie, while draining his tenement on wheel’s chemical septic tank into the storm sewer, said “Merry Christmas! Shitter was full!” and not “Shitter’s full.” No contraction. I will be pedantic to the death about this. Why? I grew up in the 1980s living this movie. The lights, the relatives, the madcap weirdness. All of it. It was my life. Christmas light tangles still fuck with me. This movie will never get old for me. It’s an integral part of my being, and the song evokes genuine happiness. It kicks ass and Mavis Staples is a goddamned national treasure.
“Last Christmas” by Wham! Yes, I am partially ashamed to admit that I made the obvious joke in 2017 that singer George Michael died last Christmas. Because he did. And that’s some timing, man. A shame because he was a magnificent singer. A lot of people dislike this song and a lot of people are wrong. I think it’s great, and among my decorations is a vinyl single of “Last Christmas” I put on a shelf in the living room. I do think it’s fair to ask why he didn’t give his heart to someone special in the first place, but I guess if he did we wouldn’t have this 1984 synth-pop banger. Happy 40th, Last Christmas!
“Fairytale of New York (feat. Kristy MacColl)” This 1987 Bukowskian tale of Christmas degradation by Celtic punkers The Pogues (RIP Shane McGowan and Kristy MacColl) vies for the No. 2 spot among my holiday favs. There’s a big genre of depressive Christmas songs about loneliness, depression, being sad and alone, etc., but none are poppy folk ballads. This song makes we wanna drink whiskey with Dylan Thomas at Greenwich Village’s White Horse Tavern on Christmas eve.
“Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen. This is not a Christmas song. Full stop. It’s a dirge about Jewish sex. I know it’s been recorded ad nauseum by a galaxy of artists, and is on many holiday music albums, but it’s not a Christmas song. I’ll allow that an individual can choose for themselves what they play at Christmas, and I have one version of this fantastic tune on my holiday playlist. I’m all for secular or spiritual sex and degeneracy, so Cohen’s song works for me in that sense. The late Jeff Buckley, whose version helped bring the song into the mainstream in 1994, described it as a “a hallelujah to the orgasm.” That’s clearly what Cohen meant when he said there are many types of hallelujahs. I also get a kick out of clueless evangelicals singing this song, all Jesus-y, and it’s about a guy getting his dick sucked in the kitchen.
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah
I mean, come on. What do you think she was doing? Reading scripture?
“Christmas Is All Around (soundtrack version)” This is from the movie “Love Actually” which I do not actually love for reasons best explained by others. But I do enjoy this song. It’s sung well by actor Bill Nighy who played the aging dirtbag rock star Billy Mack in the film, and the tune is a Christmas version of the old Troggs’ tune “Love Is All Around.” Billy Mack in the movie describes the song as a “festering turd” and maybe it is, but I still like it. Again, it’s my wide tolerance for silly, saccharine holiday music that in any other format would be relegated to the trash can.
“Merry Christmas” This is a more recent fav, recorded in 2021 by Ed Sheeran and Elton John. I cannot quite articulate why I like it other than I’ve always enjoyed Elton John and Christmas music, the lyrics are OK, and the music itself is poppy and uplifting. It just works for me. I’ve been playing it often this season. It’s maybe not great but extremely solid. It’s the Paul Konerko of Christmas songs.
“This Christmas” Donny Hathaway released this in 1970 and is grown in popularity and has been covered many times (the John Legend version rivals the original, and Legend’s 2018 album A Legendary Christmas is fucking incredible). Anyways, Hathaway’s original is a smooth, soulful but upbeat R&B classic that proves Christmas music doesn’t have to be for kids or kicks. It’s a shame Hathaway, who died in 1979, didn’t live to see his song become a staple of the season.
“Christmas Tree Farm” OK, let me be clear that I am not a Swiftie but I also don’t harbor anti-Taylor Swift sentiments. She’s just … there. This up-tempo 2019 Christmas jingle is pure Swift in its lyrical composition and music. It’s a pleasant poppy holiday tune. Her voice, when the music recedes a bit, evokes a thirtysomething English teacher talking to her class about something important. That’s not a criticism, since I obviously enjoy the song, but an observation. She’s clearly enormously popular and I don’t recoil against pop music as a lot of soi disant audiophiles do. Not holiday, but I dig her 2019 song “You Need To Calm Down” especially post Nov. 5. I’m still more Swiftian than Swiftie.
“Winter Wonderland” This warhorse of a song has been around since 1934, but it got on my radar with the funky downtempo electronic remix of the Shirley Horn version by DJ/producer Christian Prommer that was part of the 2008 Verve Remixed Christmas album.
“Officially Christmas” and “Holiday Party” I’m not that familiar with country pop duo Dan + Shay but these two Christmas songs popped up in the past couple of years and I enjoy both. They hit the charts as singles in 2021 and 2022 and both songs were released this October as part of their new Christmas music double album. I’ve not listened to any of their other music except for a few snatches here and there. These two songs don’t have any noticeable country feel to them, and strike me as more modern pop holiday tunes. I just like them and their sound. Note that the music video links begin with non musical storytelling setups before they get to the actual music.
“Christmas In L.A. (feat. Dawes)” The Killers have been a favorite of mine going on twenty years, and they do these one-off covers (like this incredible take on a Jimmy Buffett standard) and original tunes that are very good but largely unheralded. This mournful 2013 song is literally about Christmas in Los Angeles, where it can be sunny and chilly and can feel especially plastic and soulless and lonely.
Another Christmas in LA
Another pitcher of Sangria
In an empty beach café
Another Christmas in LA
Hold me tighter Carmelita
I don’t know how long I can stay
I’ve been to L.A. and to South Florida during the holidays, and it’s so unnatural to me as a native Midwesterner (where white Christmases have admittedly given way to overcast 45-degree days with drizzle instead of snow). The lyrics are about a struggling actor, who’s played by Owen Wilson in the music video (with a Harry Dean Stanton cameo). The references also channel Bruce Springsteen and Warren Zevon. It’s not a happy song even if it’s a bit orchestral. Brandon Flowers’ thin, reedy voice is perfect for songs like this.
“A Christmas To Remember” In the early 1980s, the musical partnership between Dolly Parton and Kenny Rodgers was fruitful. Their holiday duet album “Once Upon a Christmas” dropped in late 1984, when I was ten years old. I have no memory of it. It was just a few years ago that I heard this song and it immediately became a favorite. Why? They have a great musical chemistry and the production is slick without being overdone. But the real appeal for me is the lyrics. They’re well constructed but more specially, they tell the story of two characters that are well-off and seeking somewhere to spend Christmas skiing and both end up at Lake Tahoe where they meet cute and spend their time skiing, eating, sitting in front of their ski loge fireplace and fucking. They’re not crude lyrics by any stretch but they’re obvious.
OK, that’s enough. Soon, I’ll explain why “Die Hard” is legally a Christmas movie.
[UPDATE: I am a late-comer to Aloe Blacc’s jam “I Got Your Christmas Right Here” and Walker Hayes’ funny earworm “Fancy Like Christmas“, and both are in heavy rotation for me]
-30-
Unpaid Bills 
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