Overrated – More Christmas songs

Ned Bitters

This week’s inductee into the “Overrated Hall of Fame” is … more Christmas Songs.

That’s right, Uncle Ebenezer Grinch is back to rip the feel-good spirit out of another batch of Christmas dreck. The next time you’re in your car and you hear one of these songs, try actually listening to the words instead of just singing along like the unthinking sheep you’ve become. If my words take even a smidgen of joy out of your holiday season, well, don’t hate me. That wouldn’t be in the Christmas spirit.

Jingle Bells and Sleigh Ride: Let’s see. It’s nighttime, and outside here’s a foot of snow and a sub-zero wind chill. I can choose to stay inside, look at my tree, pour a stiff drink and bask in the warmth of my fireplace. Or, if feeling overly masochistic and easily swayed by a silly holiday ditty, I can head out into the bitter cold night, jump on the back of a sleigh and, in the spirit of winter fun, do the following: risk pneumonia; dodge flying horseshit; suffer a jingle-bell induced migraine; and court paralysis from an overturned sled. Sounds to me like a George W. Bush decision – a no-brainer.

Santa Baby: Here’s a joyful ode that perpetuates the stereotype of the materialistic, greedy devil-woman intent on bleeding her man’s wallet dry through the acquisition gaudy garbage. The song is nothing but a list of crap the twit wants. Only the trashiest of shallow wenches would craft a Christmas list this crass. The Christ-like yuletide message here is, “I’ll trade you pussy for some expensive bling.” The song should be retitled, “O, Whorey Night.”

Winter Wonderland/Let It Snow: Only during the four weeks leading up to Christmas do people gleefully extol the endless joys of horrible weather. Blizzards and icy roads kill hundreds of Americans every year, yet in December, we raise our voices in tribute to these meteorological killers. If we can sing the praises of winter storms, where are the hymns to the bliss brought on by hurricanes, tornadoes and thunderstorms? I don’t recall Perry Como singing “Let It Lightning” or Bing Crosby crooning “O Come, All Ye Typhoons.”

I Wish Every Day Could Be Like Christmas: Yeah, great idea. Here’s what your world would be like if the other 364 days of the year were just like Christmas Day: There’d be nothing but shit on TV, you’d have to grocery shop at 7-11, your ham-gorged relatives would be napping on your couch and the only restaurant option would be the hospital cafeteria. Not enough to sell you on an endless string of Christmas days? Consider this, Father Christmas. The bars are all closed.

Blue Christmas: More people kill themselves around Christmas than at any other time of the year, and nothing goes better with suicide than a bleak song mourning the fact that your loved one has left you, forcing you to endure the holiday season alone, unloved, unwanted and unfucked. I wonder if the sadistic prick who wrote this song first played around with “Herpes Hannukah” and “No Job New Years” before settling on this dirge.

Feliz Navidad: Here’s a surefire formula for striking it rich in the music world. Translate the phrase “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year” into another language. Set it to music. Have some blind guy repeat it over and over for four minutes. Add no other lyrics. Have song played every twenty minutes on whatever local station in your area does the “nothing but Christmas songs from now until Christmas day!” shtick. Collect royalty checks for forty years.

Do They Know It’s Christmas?: Ah, Christmas. One more month of Americans ignoring the rest of the world’s problems. Then around December 4th, Bono and friends show up on the radio singing a bleak reminder about linguine-thin Africans starving in the desert. C’mon, Band Aid, give us a break. Don’t do this to us at Christmas. Even during the other eleven months of the year, Americans don’t think about other countries unless we’re eating their food or blowing them up. Save this song for March, and instead make us feel guilty about our St. Patrick’s day indulging. We’ll be too drunk to feel too bad about it then.

Happy Christmas (War is Over): Perhaps one of the two best songs John Lennon ever wrote. It’s perfect in the simplicity of its message, and quite beautiful despite the presence of Yoko’s voice. What’s that? How can I pick on this song? Easy. Because Lennon’s vision is absurd. This is America. We love war

I Saw Three Ships: If I understand this correctly, seeing three ships is an accomplishment worth noting in song? Does this song celebrate Christmas, or the gift of sight and the ability to differentiate between modes of transport? If the latter, why not have an entire album of songs lauding the stunning visual coup of spotting human conveyances. We could have “I Saw Two Chevys and a Hyundai on My Way to the Bank Just Now,” “Look, Up There in The Sky … An Actual Air-O-Plane” and “Lo, Is That an ATV on Yon Horizon?” Any of those heroic deeds is as impressive as the much celebrated sighting of a trio of boats.

Now, if the blind bastard who sings “Feliz Navidad” saw the boats, then we’d have reason for a song.

Ned Bitters is, in fact, overrated. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.