Although it’s been said many times, many ways, I still hate The Christmas Song. Also known as the Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire Song. Also known as the song which opens up a giant sucking hole in the universe, a festive wreath-trimmed portal to sheer nothingness. The fact that I actually love Christmas and love Christmas music (even that hallucinatory Carol of The Bells song) does not keep me from wanting to punch this song, hard. Punch it in the chestnuts, even. Roast THESE, Christmas Song! Pow!
The Christmas Song is a hollow song; a big, dull, polystyrene unbreakable ornament of a song. I guess I didn’t always hate this song, but it takes up space in my head and more than thirty years of my consciousness of it has finally worn the lyrics down to their bare, flimsy logic. Paraphrased roughly, the Christmas Song goes like this: “Here’s a Christmasy thing, here’s another Christmasy thing, and another Christmasy thing, and yet another Christmasy thing. Everybody knows this one Christmasy thing and this other Christmasy thing makes things extra-Christmasy at Christmas. Children are excited about Christmas. Children know that Christmas is coming and bringing additional Christmasy things. All children, as a matter of fact, will make sure that certain Christmasy things really are as Christmasy as they purport to be. So Merry Christmas to almost everyone, and though everyone says Merry Christmas anyway, I’ll say it like it’s particularly special, even though it’s not, really.”
See? It’s full of crap. It’s the musical equivalent of snowman poop.
And you know, a lot of the Christmasy things this songs lists are pretty random. “Everybody knows a turkey and some mistletoe help to make the season bright.” That’s right: A turkey and some mistletoe. Chris pointed out that it’s like saying a Snickers Bar and the color orange are what makes Halloween so special. I mean, you could just fill in the blanks all day: An elf shoe and some marzipan! A reindeer and some gingerbread! A pudding and some tinsel stars! A cookie and some blinky lights! A fruitcake and some credit cards! Ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho! I don’t know why the world takes this song seriously and not the Barking Dog Jingle Bells song, because when it comes down to it, the two songs have about the same depth of meaning. And if you ask me, Barking Dog Jingle Bells has way more joy.
Plus, isn’t “Tiny tots with their eyes all aglow” the creepiest line ever? Discuss!
The creepiest Christmas song ever is the one about the little kid and the Christmas shoes. That song makes me want to beat somebody.
Agreed! That song makes me GO BLIND.
i have ALWAYS hated this song, and i am a lover of christmas music. (until now, i felt secretly guilty about it). now, i’m off to ask for a hippopatomus for christmas.
Christmas Shoes makes me want to dig out my ears with a grapefruit spoon. THAT is the worst song ever written. I would rather listen to “We Built This City” on continuous loop the rest of my life than EVER hear that Christmas Shoes motherfucking song again.
The melancholy in me makes me lean toward mournful Christmas music like “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” and the secular “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas,” the latter especially if sung by Ernie & Bert. But also
if sung by Judy Garland, which makes you so weepy as to want to acquire both the soul-sapping drug dependency and closeted gay husband.
If the Claus doesn’t come through with the hippo, try to find “Saa-aa-aa-aanta, I Want a Goat for Christmas.” Brilliant.
At first I thought you were talking about “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” which is a GREAT song, and really sad if you ever saw “Meet Me in St. Louis” with Judy Garland. Then I realized it was the stupid chestnut song and high-fived my cat. By the way the “Meowey Christmas” CD is festive, but scary for pets.
I will never again hear that song without singing “an elf shoe and some marzipan” after “everybody knows.” Thank you Wendy!!
I was just doing Christmassy things with friends and we were listening to the Christmas song radio station (“The only rap here is wrapping paper!”) and it was really freaking us out how many songs just have the word “Christmas” thrown in without any grammatical or logical connection to anything else. So maybe bad logic is the true spirit of the holiday.
And then the Christmas version of “From a Distance. . .” came on. . .(shudder)
Okay, now that I’ve read all the comments about this damn song I keep hearing it in my brain.
Time for the big guns, the only song known to man to extinguish any other annoying song running incessantly through your head: “America” from West Side Story.
I don’t like to resort to such drastic measures but this is an emergency.
La la la la la laaaaAmerica…..
ah, relief
I hear ya, Wendy, but I can’t bring myself to hate the Christmas Song because I love Nat King Cole so very much.
However, worst Christmas song ever? Do They Know It’s Christmas Time. Makes me want to stick a shiv-sharpened spoon into my eardrum after I stick it into the throats of everyone involved in that song. Beyond arrogant and asks me to, “Thank G-d it’s them instead of you.” I should thank G-d other people are starving? WTF?
I’d better stop before I go on a rant. But seriously, that song? “Flames on the side of my face, breathing, breath…”
I’ve always found ‘Santa Claus Is Coming To Town’ to be the creepiest, what with the “you better not pout, you better not cry” attempts to threaten children into obedience. (I should probably admit that I was already terrified of Santa as a child. He knows when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake, and he knows how to get in and out of your house unnoticed. That is frightening to any sane person.)
I think Rosemary Clooney can save almost anything, including ‘The Christmas Song’. However I prefer ‘It Came Upon A Midnight Clear’, ‘Silver Bells’, and ‘Winter Wonderland’.
I’ve been reading your blog for a longass time (since the first year or so of Poundy, at least) and this is the first time I’ve felt compelled to comment. This entry made me el OH el. It made me roffle. And then the comments reminded me that there was a song called “Christmas Shoes,” and that made me clutch my sides in a sweet mixture of agony and ecstacy.
i used to lip sych in front of the mirror to “the little drummer boy.” it was some kind of christmas music competition in my head, and everyone was blown away by my “pa rum pum pum pum” crescendo.
I like the Christmas Song because now I picture Dave Chappelle dressed as Nat King Cole pouring champage on women’s breasts. That I can live with.
I actually don’t mind the song… but I think the “Jack Frost nipping at your nose” line is a little creepier. Something about some guy coming and trying to eat my face….
Sorry to be grumpy, but I cannot stand Christmas music, and, since I’ve been forced to listen to it approximately 10 hours a day, each day this week, my loathing for EVERY song has only deepened. No one should have to hear “Frosty” AND “Rudolph” twice in one day.
seriously, “I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” has ALWAYS creeped me out. And after working in a grocery store 3 Christmases running, I began to hate the music, which was generally carols sung by soft rock artists. *brrrr*
Additionally, I work in a small bakery with the owner, who LOVES Christmas. There are garlands, lights, and a fake christmas tree surrounding my work bench. Need I say more?
I’m gonna put on
M-m-m-my-my Christmas shoes!
Excellent ear worm cure song, Liz. Mine is the theme from the Muppets (“it’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights”). Try either when “an elf shoe and some marzipan” tears around your brain like a chihuahua on meth.
Jingle Bell Rock is the Xmas song I used to hate the most.
Thinking it would be a refreshing change from the usual Christmas treacle, I bought the Johnny Cash Christmas album. I wanted to slit my wrists it was so depressing. SAD sufferers beware!
I detest Silver Bells. Somehow, it’s a song that only maudlin drunken clowns should sing. Plus it seems a paen to rampant consumerism – let’s busy up those sidewalks people!
For some reason this one has never bugged me, but now that you have plumbed its shallowness it always WILL, THANKS.
“O Holy Night” usually makes me want to whale on the singer with a board with a nail in it, but that’s not the lyrics so much as the delivery in 95% of the versions. It seems to pander to the worst of the singer’s ego–she (usually it’s a she) feels that extra-high second syllable of “diVIIIIIINE” coming up and thinks, “Hey, this performance is ALL ABOUT ME, after all–let me see if I can actually SPLIT SPUFFY’S SKULL WITH THIS NOTE!!!!”
I can deal with Bryan Setzer’s version, and actually love Brave Combo’s “O Holy Night Cha-Cha-Cha.” But most of the sopranos–urrrrgh.
I gotta agree with your hatred of “The Christmas Song.” Not only lyrically is it just annoying, but musically, I hear that first line and I’m put to sleep. Its like, musically, its saying, “I know you’re all excited and all, but just chill out. Go to sleep. Everything will still be Chrissmassy when you wake up.”
So now you’ve articulated why I should doubly hate it. Thank you.
I never realized how much I hated that song until you pointed it out. It such a wimpy, wind-bag kind of song. Especially “kids from one to ninety-two.” Vomit. When I hear this song at my mother’s house this year, I’m hitting the mimosas, and I’m hittin’ ’em HARD.
I’ll see your “Do They Know It’s Christmas Time” and raise you a “Wonderful Christmas Time” with a side order of “Happy Xmas (War is Over).” Gahhhhh! You would think that two ex-Beatles could come up with something a little less annoying, but sadly: no.
Okay, I love Christmas carols but HATE Christmas songs and the one I think I hate most of all (though it’s close) would be “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” AUGH. It makes me want to rip my own arm off and beat people to death with it.
I don’t know if you have it in America, but “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day” tops my personal hate-poll. No, I totally don’t wish it was every day!
Kids with glowing eyes? Sounds ominously like “Village of the Damned” to me…
Wow. I thought I was the only one who hated this song as much as you do. Thank you thank you thank you for confirming thoughts I’ve had all along yet could not put into words.
Veronica – That’s the point. The lyrics are nonsense and should be ignored at all costs. The tune was composed by Mel Torme, and your comment about the melody perfectly fits with the whole velvet-fog M.O.
Personally, I like it…
Happy Holidays!
You are all wrong wrong and wrong. The worst Christmas song, bar none, is the excrescence that was passed by Sir Paul and landed with a turdlike thud on the muzak stations of every retail establishment for eternity, something that must be named “Simply Having A ….” You fill in the rest, I can’t bear to risk having it stuck in my head. Quit picking on one the Velvet Fog’s few writing credits – it’s better than having to listen to him sing. You want a meaningful secular Christmas song? Sheesh, take a pill folks.
Wendy, this is the first time I’ve felt compelled to comment, because I’ve all but given up on Christmas music, especially that damn chestnuts roasting song. I grew up in the kinda house where the only place you could possibly roast chestnuts is over the pile of smoldering cigarette butts my chain-smoking dad (god love him) left in the ashtray after an evening of getting shithoused with my uncles. However, I’ve found some nice punk rock alternatives to keep me in the holiday spirit.
Personal fave … “My First Christmas As a Woman” by The Vandals.
Best line … “I won’t have to tuck it behind me, since I got my brand new vaginey.”
Merry F-ing Christmas!!
I have a bizarre affection for the song, ever since I heard a little kid (2nd, 3rd grade, who knows) singing it as “Jack Frost roasting on an open fire, reindeers picking at your nose…”. I truly believe it was not an intentional parody–the poor little blighter just couldn’t remember the words and was using a few that scanned.
Oh, man. This and your previous 2004 blog nearly killed me…especially last night when I was a captive audience for jazz legend Cedar Walton’s recorded performance of “The Christmas Song.”
(See http://tinyurl.com/yhmzjn .)
If you think the Nat King Cole version is bad, imagine the free-form jazz stylings of this song…and yes, I inserted my own “elf shoe and some marzipan” lyric…
Christmas music aficionado,
Kristy in Texas
Chipmunks roasting on an open fire
Hot sauce dripping from their toes
http://www.artistdirect.com/nad/store/artist/album/0,,1044368,00.html
I f&*king HATE that “pah rum pah pah pum pum” song. Especially the versions with the creepy background singers going “Hrum, hrum, hrum!” Give me chestnuts any day over that song.
Oh, dear. I may have found a Dishonorable Mention Award in the Christmas Song category; whoever wrote “Dominic the Christmas Donkey” was a jackass.
See (and HEAR!) at:
http://tinyurl.com/yclu9b
Actual URL: http://www.minibite.com/christmas/dominickthedonkey.htm
I know it is late to be commenting on Christmas songs still (or heck, maybe I’m just 10 months early), but I used to work in a bakery (4am-noon) and during the holidays the boss tuned into a E-Z listening station that had all manner of horrible crap on it.
A song that didn’t get mentioned here–but definitely deserves consideration as THE WORST (along with Hippopotamus) is: “Mamacita, Donde Esta Santa Clause”. I don’t know the shoe one every one was talking about earlier, but I’m cringing!
A Fast And Simple Way To
I know this is totally last year’s Christmas post, but I realized the other day, while driving to my grandma’s (whose last name, by the way, is also McClure), that in three years she will be SPECIFICALLY EXCLUDED from that song’s well-wishing. I bet that will feel pretty sad for her. She’s a cool grandma and very sweet, and she doesn’t deserve that kind of disrespect!