Most loved / hated Christmas music

NPR is encouraging listeners of its Weekend Edition Sunday program to send in lists of most loved or (more likely) hated Christmas music, with reasons why. I thought that would be a good subject for a blog post--I'll recommend it to my 212 class shortly--and if I decide to write in, here's what I'll propose:

My "most hated" list is much longer than my "much loved" list, for reasons that have to do with what we were talking about in class last week. Pop culture phenomena are both promoted and killed off by circulation: see a clever image or hear a bit of music once, and it might strike your fancy. (Remember the first time you saw a smiley face?) Repetitions, up to a certain point which is difficult to define, are positive, in that they certify your taste. You can take a degree of pride in thinking, Hey, I saw that first! I'm in touch with the culture! Then, at a later time, everyone has heard the song enough times to be sick of it--repetition has killed it off.

That's the problem with, say, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, popularized by the singing cowboy, Gene Autry, in a 1949 song based on a 1939 book written by an impoverished parent and bought by Montgomery Ward (according to the Wikipedia entry on the subject). It's appeared since in a frequently broadcast TV special (featuring Burl Ives as the narrating snowman) and multiple times per day on the muzak in stores. It's a cute idea ground into the ground, with the implication that You Must Love This Song, This Spirit! It's Christmas! What Are You, A Scrooge? A Atheist? Get Out There And Shop! Not that I'm a zealot or anything, but where does the Baby Jesus come in with Rudolph?

This year I'm hearing "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" a lot, on frequently aired TV commercials (see two paragraphs above) and in stores. Again, I feel that I'm being forced to be chipper. I'll get to chipper on my own, thank you very much.

So some hated Christmas songs, in no particular order:

1. Santa Baby. I heard this first a few years ago and couldn't believe it. A vamp voice sucking up to Santa Claus to get him to bring her lots of presents. Clearly training girls to be quasi-prostitutes.

2. I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas. This came out in the 1950s and was aired a lot at this season in my childhood. Like "All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth," the persona is a kid asking something cutely inappropriate as a present--the particularly noxious thing about this song is that it has a catchy musical hook and will stick in your brain with tiny hooks, kind of like Velcro.

3. White Christmas. This song gives saccharine a bad name. It's especially bad with the introductory part, about "There's never been such a day / In Beverly HIlls, LA."

4. The Chipmunk Song. This too derives from the '50s, back when tape recorders were the new technology, and people could amuse themselves with talking or singing into the tape at one speed and playing it back at a higher (or lower) speed. Their creator, Ross Bagdasarian, performed as Dave Seville (which I have from The Chipmunks' entry on Wikipedia), releasing a novelty song that won Grammy awards and spawned animated TV series which is probably still bouncing around Nickolodeon. The music is simple and insipid, the presumption like #2 above being childish voices wanting things that are inappropriate ("Please, Christmas, don't be late").

5. Next I'm thinking of an entire category, as I'd rather avoid calling these things to mind: Fast rock renditions of Christmas carols. These mostly surface in pieces on TV commercials.

Looking over these things above, what they have as a common element is their insincerity. Either because they are trumped up to make a buck and fill air-time during the holidays, or because they make a pretence at something which even the persona can't possible think or believe, they have a crappy ethos.

[Late addition: How could I forget "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer"???]

Now for the shorter section, Christmas songs I like:

1. Polish Christmas carols. When teaching in Poland during 1982-84 and again 1987-88, I made a point of buying records, including several of Christmas carols. (You can find some titles here, only you probably need to be able to read Polish).

2. Some religious carols in English, particularly those with long pedigrees. Adeste Fideles, or "O Come All You Faithful," is a good example of these.

3. An exception to the hated rock category above, the Beach Boys' "Little St. Nick." I love their harmonies enough--and this one was never overplayed that much--so that I can hum along with it.