Christmas Song Rant

Well, Christmas has come and gone and it was pretty terrific.

As for shopping, I took one day to reconnaissance and get ideas and then 3 days of actual shopping and *poof* I was done! Well, not exactly, "poof," as my feet ached and my leg muscles tightened so I hobbled more than walked, but still, overall...good.

In the last post, I mentioned Christmas songs I wish they would play more frequently on the radio. This got me thinking of Christmas songs I wish they would take out of rotation...at least for a little while.

Feliz Navidad. No offense to my Spanish-speaking peeps, but ugh. What is it about this song that starts rubbing my nerves raw after the first chorus? The radio stations play this song way too much.

Do They Know It's Christmastime? Or whatever the title of this well-intentioned, but obnoxious song is. Something about the third or fourth time you hear it...it begins to sound self-indulgent and a tiny bit condescending...benevolent, but in a nauseating way. Ha! Sounds like a way to describe a wine. "It had an arrogant nose and no legs."

Santa, Baby. Call me old fashioned, but I do not think Christmas carols or any song about Santa should sound like or allude to sex. Don't get me wrong...in the right context it's fine (e.g., Fever...love that song). And I know she's not singing about the real Santa, as in the one who lives in the North Pole and has a penchant for cookies, but still...it kinda grosses me out.

That Christmas Shoes Song. They even made a tv movie out of it. Talk about emotional manipulation. "Please pull my strings, Puppetmaster!" Bleh. The fact that they use a little kid to sing part of it makes it even worse somehow. Adds to the manipulation factor, methinks. It's so blatant it should be funny; however, I just find it annoying (insert nose wrinkle here).

The Little Drummer Boy. This song is usually sung waaaayyyy too slow and something about the Pa-rup-a-pum-pum part makes my eyes start to roll to the back of my head. I can't control it. Weird, since this is one song in which I would do the "ding, ding" parts on the piano while my sister played the song (we didn't have a triangle). Somehow even the "ding, ding" has lost its luster.

One last general pet peeve...with all the remakes of Christmas classics, does every vocalist need to insert so many unnecessary runs in the song? Beyond the show-offy-ness of it all, it truly is an unwelcome distraction. Part of the joy and allure of Christmas Carols is that you can sing along. Who has fun singing along when the singer starts singing in different octives? Ugh.

Some may think I'd add the Chipmunk Song here, but I actually like it and still think it's cute. I also haven't reached my saturation point for "Merry Christmas, Darling" although some years the radio stations really push that one to the edge. Then, there are songs like "O Holy Night," "Ring Christmas Bells," "The Christmas Song" and "Do You Hear What I Hear?" that I can listen to repeatedly by different artists.

This started out as a nice post-Christmas post and ended up being a rant of sorts. Hmm...doesn't seem to bode well for the New Year!