Posted on 12/08/2004 8:50:15 AM PST by presidio9
EVER been driven up the chimney by a Christmas song that you really, really hate? New Jersey researchers have named the six worst Christmas songs of all time, as picked by holiday-music fans who were asked to rate more than 600 yule tunes.
The biggest lump of coal goes to "O Holy Night" as sung by the foul-mouthed Cartman from "South Park," according to Edison Media Research.
Close behind are Seymour Swine & the Squealers' butchered "Blue Christmas," "Jingle Bells" by The Singing Dogs and, separately, Barbra Streisand and "12 Days of Guido Christmas" by the Ha Ya Doin' Boys.
"We play very lightly the Barbra Streisand version of 'Jingle Bells' because she's got a following in New York," says Jim Ryan, programmer of top-rated Lite FM (WLTW/106.7).
"People tend not to like it because it's a really fast, up-tempo version of 'Jingle Bells' almost like she did it as a goof," Ryan told The Post.
WPLJ (95.5 FM) music director Tony Mascaro says his research turned up a sixth song that listeners can't stand: Elmo & Patsy's "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer."
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
No. This one is a Gospel singer/songwriter. He's from Colorado.
I'll one-up you: Madonna's version of Santa Baby.
About a 7 on the Yikes scale.
Is that the one that also has "Police Stopped my Car" sung to the tune of "Feliz Navidad"? I kind of like that one.
Best Christmas song ever?
For me it's "Merry Christmas" by the waitresses. Makes me want to run out and buy them some tranquilizers.
Actually, I like Paul McCartney's "Simply Having A Wonderful Christmas Time". Makes me feel happy.
That's a sensible explanation.
The larger substantive point remains that under liberal pressure Christmas has been methodically gutted of any spiritual significance that once bound most Americans to its common public cultural focus. The only "Christmas" music really allowed without protest in the public sphere today is the puerile and the profane.
Even many conservatives are complicit in the destruction of the tradition. Sing "O Holy Night" with reverence in public and the ACLU will seek an injunction before you get to the word "stars." But allow cartoon character Eric Cartman to take the public stage and spew the most foul and corrupted version of it that can be imagined and we guffaw, applaud, and whistle our approval while the ACLU turns blithely away with tacit approval.
I can enjoy a good joke and a funny song or Christmas sketch as well as the next person. In the 70s Cheech & Chong did a very funny bit about Santa using magic dust to get "real small"; the restaurant scene in "A Christmas Story" in which a Chinese crew sings "deck the hawrs with berrs of horry, fa ra ra ra ra ra" always cracks me up too. But that silly stuff was adjunct to the Christmas season when I was a child. The underlying foundation of the season remained the birth of Jesus Christ, an event that most of us celebrated and shared communally in a reserved and dignified fashion.
Now all that's left is the profane and silly stuff lest our quiet, dignified cultural celebration offend atheists and other Christophobe liberals.
Wasn't that "Christmas Wrapping" by the Waitresses?
Oh. My. God. I think I had blocked that one out because it's so awful.
Actually it all wears on me by [about] the 24th.
What -- nobody's mentioned The Ventures' version of Sleigh Ride?
(ok, so it's my favorite... I'm sure somebody hates it...)
If you say so. Either way, its just plain annoying.
I agree 1000%! It doesnt feel like the Christmas season until I have seen it. I have been playing the soundtrack all the time since I (finally) got it. Guaraldi had a knack for capturing a mood.
Only once did someone complain that the music was disturbing them in another cubicle, which resulted in a smile, an apology and turning the music down slightly. But no one ever complained on religious grounds. A good thing, too, because I was ready for the them. I had Streisand's and Mannilow's CD in waiting (actually, in my wife's collection at home where I would have borrowed them from).
I was ready to respond: but they're *Jewish* Christmas tunes. And let me add this: Mannilow was more of a Winter Wonderland kind of guy, but Striesand goes straight for "Ave, Maria".
Annoying songs would have to include Mariah Carey's "Joy to the World" from her Christmas album. He covered the Three Dog Night version. (I am NOT making this up.)
TS
The real Christmas message isn't just being purged from music, it's being purged from the stores. A few years ago I noticed that Santa Claus figures were being transformed into New Age wizard-type characters, with half-moons on his hat etc. And it's hard to find Christmas cards with a religious them in many stores, and I noticed this year that Fred Meyer stores (large West Coast chain) don't have nativity sets for sale.
WPLJ in NY switched to an all-Christmas format the day after Thanksgiving and the play it constantly.
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