The NC Double Scrooge: Songbook Division
Submitted by Sarah D. Bunting on December 15, 2010 – 9:22 AM154 Comments
I’ve made my feelings about various Christmas songs clear elsewhere, so I won’t belabor the point, but today’s the day in the NC Double Scrooge on which we formally censure the holiday tunes we hate the most. I’ve never even heard “The Christmas Shoes,” but y’all seemed to feel quite strongly about it, so now’s your chance to throw it into a semifinal.
Tomorrow, we’ll vote on Christmas movies and specials; finals start soon!
NC Double Scrooge, Songbook Division: Please Pick The Three (3) WORST
- "The Christmas Shoes" (12%, 400 Votes)
- "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" -- I mean…no (12%, 381 Votes)
- "Wonderful Christmastime," Paul "Smugbob Casiopants" McCartney (9%, 286 Votes)
- "Do They Know It's Christmas?," Band-Aid (9%, 279 Votes)
- Traditional hymns like "Lo, How A Rose" cheapened by pop-star over-singing (7%, 238 Votes)
- "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" -- and it was fucked up (7%, 234 Votes)
- "Baby It's Cold Outside" -- because nothing says "the holidays" like date rape (6%, 192 Votes)
- "Jingle bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg" (4%, 126 Votes)
- "Last Christmas," Wham! (4%, 119 Votes)
- "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" -- all versions (and the naughty/nice wordplay they bring with them), but especially Springsteen's yelly iteration (3%, 104 Votes)
- "Little Drummer Boy" (3%, 95 Votes)
- "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)," John Lennon (3%, 90 Votes)
- "Feliz Navidad" (3%, 88 Votes)
- "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and the derfy "like Monopoly!" interjections (2%, 74 Votes)
- "Jingle Bell Rock" (2%, 74 Votes)
- "Meli Kalikimaka," in which Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters insert an earwig that will not work itself loose until Easter (2%, 62 Votes)
- "Here Comes Santa Claus" -- seriously? "Santa Claus Lane"? What is he, the Easter Bunny? The idea of Elvis humping Santa Claus does not roast our chestnuts (2%, 61 Votes)
- "Blue Christmas" (1%, 44 Votes)
- "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas" (1%, 43 Votes)
- "Auld Lang Syne" -- sounds like an old-timey disease (1%, 36 Votes)
- Anything Dolly Parton or Willie Nelson sings (1%, 33 Votes)
- "Frosty the Snowman" (1%, 31 Votes)
- "I'll Be Home For Christmas" (1%, 30 Votes)
- "Christmas in Dixie" (1%, 25 Votes)
- "Mary's Boy Child," Harry Belafonte (1%, 23 Votes)
- "Santa's Beard," the Beach Boys (1%, 19 Votes)
- "Christmas in My Hometown," Charley Pride (1%, 17 Votes)
- "Sleigh Ride" (0%, 16 Votes)
Total Voters: 1,104
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Tags: *NSYNC Keckler music NC Double Scrooge winter-holiday agita
But the “Through the years we all will be together/if the fates allow” is in the Sinatra version too. What he changed was the “until then we’ll have to muddle through somehow” to “hang a shining star upon the highest bough.” Which doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, I’ll agree, but I can’t really hate on it. I associate the Judy Garland version directly with “Meet Me in St Louis” and the other versions with the general Christmas radio-and-department-store song canon, so they feel more Christmas-y to me.
Aww, John Denver and the Muppets! LOVE!
Also, loving all the hate for “Do They Know That It’s Christmas(Because If They Don’t WE’LL BE HAPPY TO SING ABOUT IT”)because I read online somewhere that even the writer of that song hates it now and wishes the idea had never come into his brain. Hee!
@ceyenne, the best part of the “We Are Santa’s Elves” crap is even SANTA hates hearing the elves sing! Remember, Mrs. Claus (the one with the wierd, unexplained germanic accent) is insisting that he go to the elf concert, and Santa’s all “Hell, I hate that crap yowling the REST of the year, this is a special torture, also, Rudolf is a freak and his family doesn’t get paid this year!”
Santa was such a total bag of dicks in that special.
How is “Mary, Did You Know?” not on here? Is it only a Bible-belt thing like “Christmas Shoes?” I would rather listen to an eternal loop of Feliz Navidad and Little Drummer Boy than here “Mary, did you know… that your BAAAAAABY boy would someday walk on water?” even once.
I quite like most Christmas music (even some pop incarnations) but “Last Christmas,†“Do They Know It’s Christmas,†and “Wonderful Christmastime†make me homicidal. Bruce Springsteen’s straining, creaking “Santa Claus is Coming to Town†is fourth – it makes my throat hurt to listen to it. Go sit down somewhere with some tea and a lozenge, Boss.
@TipperTapper: Agreed on “Baby It’s Cold Outside.†I’ve always seen it as the woman coyly insisting she has to leave when she really wants to stay – she just wants him to insist. I will acknowledge the “hey, what’s in this drink?†line as being creepy, but I love the Ray Charles/Betty Carter version.
Never heard “The Christmas Shoes,†and I guess I should consider myself lucky.
Cindy: I am one of maaaaaaaany people who thought it was “Up on the rooftop reindeer paws!” so I sympathize. (This was until like… last year.)
Yeah. Jingle Bells (original style) is just the worst holiday song in the bouncy irritating earworm category. Actually any version. Hate that song. And the ominous Santa Claus is Coming to Town can just die already too.
However, Erin in SLC? Totally with you. Mariah’s All I Want For Christmas is outstanding. And also I agree with Letterman. Darlene Love singing Baby Please Come Home is just one of the best Christmas things ever.
Fortunately I don’t know most christmas songs by name… so my brain has escaped having them on an incessant loop for the rest of the day.
That being said… is the Alvin and the Chipmunks song about the huuuuula hoooop not on here? Or does it only play on Southern California radio? I swear, I hear it EVERY.SINGLE.YEAR. driving with my parents during Christmas. I don’t know why I hate that song so… as a child I was mildly obsessed with the TV show…
Glee toothpaste what? My 90s-childhood brain doesn’t seem to remember such a line… but if anyone remembers what real line it came after my aforementioned brain cells might be able to tell you what has since replaced it.
Ok, so I have to defend I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas, because I am from Oklahoma and that’s where it originated.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Want_a_Hippopotamus_for_Christmas
@sb: In this category, our all Christmas, all the time station has Dan Fogelberg’s “Same Old Lang Syne” in heavy rotation. Because he met his old lover in the grocery store, you see, on Christmas Eve.
I was startled to find that this ballad rates it own Wikipedia page, complete with plot synopsis. It’s based on a true story!
But it still has nothing to do with Baby Jesus.
Adding multiple votes for “We Wish You A Merry Christmas (Now give us tons of crap or we won’t leave you alone)”. HAAAAAAAAAAATE!!
When I was in highschool the choir went caroling to downtown businesses (ah the joys of growing up in a small town) and I refused to sing that song. Just stood there and let the rest sing around me.
Cindy: True story: I always used to hear the “Parson Brown” line from “Winter Wonderland” as “parse and brown.” Which made no sense. I think I was about 30 before I figured out what the real words are.
I did that with another Christmas song – I always thought it was “Up on the housetop reindeer paws…” and was confused because reindeer don’t have PAWS they have HOOVES don’t the songwriters know that?
@ferretrick
I’m in San Francisco (and have lived in the Bay Area since 1986), and I swear that I have never heard the Christmas Shoes. I vaguely remember there was a TV movie with Rob Lowe called the Christmas Shoes – is the song another iteration of the same story? I promise that if I decide to vote again (using my work computer, not my home computer), I will seek out the Christmas Shoes for a listen before pulling the trigger. However, I didn’t vote for some other loathed songs on this list because I hadn’t heard them either – do I have to listen to all of them before I can cast my vote?
FWIW, I don’t think the election analogy works – I don’t have to listen to Palin’s economic policies (or God forbid, her thoughts on women’s reproductive choices) before deciding I would never vote for her in a million years.
@Keckler and company: It’s “Feliz Navidad, próspero año y felicidad.”
@Cindy: I love The Boss’s “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town,” ’cause Clarence Clemons kicks twelve kinds of ass.
@Anlyn: Fortunately for me, the Pomp band was not compulsory, so I only had to do it once. My senior year, I was in the jazz band, and we played at graduation and I got to do a badass solo on my tenor sax. I would kill for video of this “performance.”
I actually came back with the express purpose of cheating and voting multiple times for “Christmas Shoes”. Damn your security, TN!
I tripped over my cat and broke a toe lunging at the radio as I heard the first notes of it last year…
OOOH! TC! That whole album is my favorite for Christmas and the whole year through! Yay!!
I know this is a regional one, but ~hate~! “Christmas Eve in Washington” (listen here if you just like torture) by Maura Sullivan. Yech, and if you’re in the neighborhood, you’ve heard it a bazillion times a year since the dawn of time.
@Wendy: Aww, I kind of like “Mary, Did You Know?” It’s on my Christmas playlist but I actually associate it with Mother’s Day because my mom’s choir sang it for a Mother’s Day Mass one year.
It is best in small doses, though.
Okay, finally found and watched not just “Christmas Shoes” but the version by Randy Newman with SCENES FROM THE MOVIE.
Oh, my dear sweet Lord. That is just the creepiest, crawliest, most horrible schmaltzy crap fest ever. Every single line is tuned for, like, Nuclear Heartstring Yank. Dirty kid, no money, dying mom, dad telling young child to hurry because there’s not much time and MOMMY’S GOING TO DIE ON CHRISTMAS EVE and the kid needs these shoes so she can look pretty when she meets JESUS???!!? Who wrote these lyrics, Edgar Allen Poe??
It’s like eating three pounds of Cheez Whiz topped with lemon juice! Jesus must drink and projectile vomit whenever he hears this garbage.
@ RC: the line in Rudolph goes
“Then all the reindeer loved him
and they shouted out with glee…”
(like the toothpaste!)
was the interjection we used when I was a kid (when there used to be a toothpaste called ‘Glee’).
TipperTapper says that now it’s
(like the TV show!)
@Kate: Oh God, that’s the one. And it seems somehow appropriate that one of the places it appears has a url beginning with “klassy”. Yeaaaah.
The person I really feel sorry for is the guy who got stuck doing the solo while the rest of us went “YO!” at the end.
Unrelatedly, but re: the religious references in “Santa Claus Comes Tonight”* , I always found “hang your stockings and say your prayers” just a little threatening.
I actually like both “Wonderful Christmastime” and “All I Want for Christmas”. I cannot explain this, and plan to ask Mom about her drinking habits during the second trimester.
*I bet that’s also a porn movie title. And I’m not Googling it.
Official worst Christmas song I have ever heard is “Santa Never Made It Into Darwin”, about Cyclone Tracy flattening Darwin, Australia on Christmas Eve 1974.
Sample lyrics:
Santa never made it into Darwin
Disaster struck at dawn on Christmas Day
Santa never made it into Darwin
A big wind came and blew the town away
Christmas morning was a nightmare
As Cyclone Tracy struck
It ripped apart the buildings
Like an atom bomb had struck
Ahem.
Also – Wonderful Christmastime. HAAATE.
I wish that Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and the interjections were a separate vote because I love the song, but for some reason the interjections have always been one of my anal-retentive control freak pressure points.
Even as a kid, I was like “No!!!! That’s not how the song is MEANT to go” . Then I was at library story time this week with my daughter, where we sang the song and one mother was doing the interjections and I still seriously wanted to punch her in the face. And then I cursed my Monica-ish tendencies, but they’ve been there all my life. I once had a tantrum because my older sister sub-divided my dollhouse into two apartments.
@Erin in SLC I feel the same way about The Platters’ Blue Christmas. It’s so jaunty that every time I hear it I think “liars, they’re not going to have a blue Christmas without me at all”
Oh, MAN, I almost forgot!
Anyone else have experience with that godawful “something stuck up in the chimney and I don’t know what it is” song, sung by the (allegedly) adorable little kid? Santa is still in the chimney as of the final verse, one year later. Santa is DEAD AND PUTREFYING in the CHIMNEY.
…I thought for a moment it might be a confabulation on my part or the remnant of a bad dream, but NO. Google confirms that it happened.
We always interjected, “Then how the reindeer loved him (loved him), and they shouted out with glee (yip-ee!)” – I had no idea there was a toothpaste line, ever.
While I wholeheartedly agree that “Christmas Shoes” is the absolute worst song, Christmas or otherwise, I’m going to write-in my second-least-favorite Christmas song: “Same Old Lang Syne” by Dan Fogelberg. It is catchy and things might be different if radio stations didn’t try to pass it off as Christmas music, but two people drinking in the parking lot of a grocery store just doesn’t seem very Christmas-y to me. Also, the word “lover” in the first sentence throws me off for some reason. I can’t take it.
@Erin in SLC –
I remember that song!!! It was played a lot during Christmas on this radio show my mom’s boyfriend listened to, “Dr. Demento”. The last few lines are creepy as hell:
“And he’s stuck up in the chimney
And he doesn’t say a word
And he’ll be there every Christmas.
And we’ll have him every Christmas.”
Chilling. On a similar note, I heard another song on that show, “Christmas is Revolting (And so are the Elves)”. It’s sung by the elves, and the lyrics are SO mean-spirited that I actually thought it was hilarious when I was twelve (maybe not so much now):
http://www.themadmusicarchive.com/song_details.aspx?SongID=2618
“Christmas- a special time of year
Suicides, moldy fruitcake and shoplifting
.
.
.
We’re sick of making toys
For ugly girls and boys
We know why lions eat their young”
I happened to hear “Merry Christmas” by The Waitresses on the way home and realized it wasn’t on the list. It’s sort of an anti-Christmas song, so I appreciate the spirit, but it’s nearly “Wonderful Christmastime” levels of repetitive, synthesized, unmelodic awful. Any good will from “Square Pegs” obliterated.
The absolute worst part of going to Jersey for Christmas is that Springsteen song playing on every radio station (and by proxy, in every diner, convenience store, and family member’s car) every 12 goddamn seconds.
I’m a music teacher, and add me to the list of those who were eager to vote for “Santa, Baby”. Mainly because it’s just a gross song, but also because every year some sweet, innocent child begs me to let them learn it. I’m usually way too willing to let kids learn whatever they want, but I resist all whining when that request comes up. NEVER! Unfortunately, just the question gets it stuck in my head for the remainder of the season, and I end up singing it around the house. I can’t imagine what my roommates must think.
If I could have voted for “Baby It’s Cold Outside” three times, you’d better believe I would have. *shudder*
Christmas Shoes should win this hands down, but my second most hated Christmas song isn’t listed here – All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth. Gah!
Signs that I am occasionally too young and uneducated for my own good: when I saw Auld Lange Syne on the list, my reaction was “What? NO! Dan Fogelberg 4EVA!!”
Incredulous, I turned to YouTube. Turns out that other song is also called Auld Lange Syne.
Yeah, so I’ll just be over here drinking a toast to my own innocence.
I thought I might chime in with one of the Christmas songs I actually like – I learned it in high school a million years ago and it’s called “The 12 Days After Christmas”. The first verse:
The first day after Christmas, my true love and I had a fight.
And so I chopped the pear tree down and burned it just for spite.
Then, with a single cartridge, I shot that blasted partridge,
That my true love, my true love gave to me.
We sang in 8 part harmony, very sweetly, which made the lyrics that much more fun. Senior year I got to deliver the most coveted spoken solo line: Actually, I kept one of the drummers.
Anyway – lyrics are here: http://tinyurl.com/58ln3j and an ok version can be heard here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxpDlU6t–Y
For a slight change of pace — since “The Little Drummer Boy” has come up on this thread and previous ones — this week I had my heart melted a little bit regarding this song.
The other night, I had the chance to see Brian Stokes Mitchell in concert at Carnegie Hall with the New York Pops. It was your standard holiday concert — symphonic “pops” arrangements of Christmas favorites. I saw that “Little Drummer Boy” was in the lineup and was like, oh, here we go. Then BSM introduces the song saying that he’s always loved it because for him it’s about the necessity of using whatever gifts you’re given to bring joy into the world. And then he introduces an actual drummer boy — a thirteen year old kid comes out, and plays a hand drum (really amazingly well) along with BSM and the orchestra. And watching him, so intent on what he’s doing, realizing that he’s playing IN CARNEGIE HALL with a full orchestra behind him and what an amazing thing that must be at that age … it got me choked up, I admit it.
DOMINICK THE DONKEY!!!!!! AAAAAAAAACKKKKKKKGGGGGHHHHKKKKK!!!!
Ah, Christmas Shoes–the sad clown on black velvet of Christmas songs. Holy cats, that song is awful. I’m counting it as a Christmas miracle that I’ve only heard it once this year.
I can’t believe I cannot vote for Dominic the Donkey. It’s the most annoying song I have EVER heard, with the small children and the fake Italian and someone making braying donkey noises…good lord.
I love Kathy Mattea’s version of “Mary, Did You Know”. But then, I love Kathy Mattea.
I can’t believe I left off “12 Days of Christmas”! That song goes on FOREVER. HAAAAAAAAAATE. Plus, every time I hear it, I remember an old Disney Christmas album we had, where Goofy sings “Five Onion Rings” at one point.
One that keeps coming to mind that I actually like is “Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey”. I even like the little Rankin/Bass cartoon that created the song. I used to drive Mom nuts playing it on the piano and trying to learn all the words.
You guys, I just got a Jib-Jab card with “Feliz Navidad.” It was the worst on top of the worst!!
When I was a young’un, I thought that our elementary school had invented the derfy “like Monopoly!” interjections for Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I distinctly remember thinking that [random new girl] would be surprised to hear “our” version. She was not, I was schooled, and thus I got my first lesson in exceptionalism. Except it was Moss Bluff Elementary-exceptionalism, and not American exceptionalism. That childhood memory means I couldn’t possibly vote for it here, even though as an adult, I can admit that the interjections are, indeed, derfy.
I’m also sad to see that my most-hated Christmas carol, “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” wasn’t a choice. But I realize trying to list all possible carols would be impossible, and I don’t think I’m in very good company with my hatred. [Sars, is “carol” isn’t a proper noun, is it?]
Holy shit – I am sitting in the Burbank airport, where a playlist of the worst versions of ALL THESE SONGS is playing without mercy. I am positive I am not going to get on my flight without hearing Christmas Shoes at least twice.
Sitting here, however, I have discovered the only thing worse than completely horrific, whiny versions of Christmas songs: the asshole who decides to sing along in whiny-mimic. Awful. Simply awful.
@Anyln, I have that Disney Christmas album! (This old timey technology called a record!) With the Disney chipmunks singing the Chipmunk song instead of those other chipmunks. Always loved Goofy’s onion rings line but hated the First Noel sung by a pre-Brat-Pack Molly Ringwald.
StillAnotherKate, I sang that song in high school choir too!!! Still hum it every year around this time.
@Keckler: The BarlowGirl version of “O Holy Night” is pretty good, although the production is so overdone as to approach Nightwish levels.
In fact, I’d kind of like to do a mixtape of nothing but “O Holy Night”, because that seems to be the carol that inspires the most variety.
Thank you for including that Godawful Wonderful Christmastime on the list. Oh, the hate. Freaking Paul McCartney. Next time one of those stupid “who’s the best Beatle” conversations come up, this is what I’m going to cite as the reason Paul can never ever win that debate. Until now I’ve simply said: “McCartney sucks and I can prove it in one word: Wings.”
And I am also grateful to not know this dreaded Christmas shoes song.
I would love a mixed tape of “O Holy Night.” I have a few versions. Martina McBride’s is decent. John Berry’s is great. Mariah’s is passable.
“Twelve Nights of Christmas” gets a pass from me simply because Alvin deliberatly messes up the verses on The Chipmunks cd.
If I could vote for “Christmas Shoes” three times, I would have. That being said, “Home for the Holidays” needs to be on that list. Earworm! Have had it in my head now for weeks.
Ah well, only 10 days until Christmas.
I own a copy of the Christmas Shoes movie–so deliciously awful is it. We have a whole tacky Christmas party based on that movie and the N*SYNC Christmas album. (“I wish Santa was here to see this / It’s beautiful under my tree”? Creepy pervs.)
Fun activity: Make a playlist of the N*SYNC Christmas album, and insert “Dick in a Box” somewhere in the middle; play it at a party and see if anybody notices…
I just recalled Cheech & Chong’s “Santa Claus & his Old Lady.” That’s one I’d like hear!
“Little Drummer Boy” is only good IF THERE ARE ACTUAL DRUMS IN IT. I heard it done in a hippie store with drums and it was so much better.
Seriously, it wouldn’t be a bad song if not for the fact that usually THERE ARE NO DRUMS IN IT, IN A SONG ABOUT A DRUMMER. Because whoever wrote it thought “pa-rum-pa-pa-pum” was so adorable it must be repeated fifty thousand times.