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You are here: Home / Music / File This One Under “People With Too Much Time On Their Hands”

File This One Under “People With Too Much Time On Their Hands”

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In my ongoing effort to encounter — and then share — some of the better weirdness of the intertubes (and thus, to prove that social media isn’t only a seething cess pool of the worst of humanity in which all blessedness, light and hope will drown — merely mostly so)*…here’s a musical interlude that demonstrates that not all Christmas music sucks, or at least, not all in the same way:


Per the caption:

This musician has combined Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, Mozart’s Divertimento in D and Wham!’s pop Christmas staple to create a surprisingly beautiful cello arrangement of ‘Last Christmas’….

The arrangement and performance comes from Kjell Magne Robak, with camera work by Ragne Vicotria Stauri. Bravo, lads.

What’s your choice for the very worst Christmas/holiday musical torture.  It can be either a tune or a performance…but share your misery in the comments.  Other than that this thread is open for jackals.

*The Language Police, Fugitive Run-on Division, will soon have me in custody, don’t you worry, not one  little bit, no sirreee…or ma’ameee.1

1:  Oh yes. I do self-indulge. Why do you ask?

Reader Interactions

61Comments

  3. 3.

    lollipopguild

    For me it is not one song it’s that so many versions of good songs are out there that are Just Badly Done. You have professionals who put out songs that are badly arranged and phoned in by the singer.

  4. 4.

    Eljai

    My dirty little secret is that I have always adored the Wham! version, but that arrangement is really quite lovely!

  5. 5.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Trump finally went there

    WASHINGTON ― Having run through his first choices for his chief of staff vacancy without any luck, President Donald Trump is considering his own son-in-law for the job.

    Jared Kushner, the husband of Trump’s daughter Ivanka and already an official White House adviser, met with Trump Wednesday about the job, a top Republican close to the White House told HuffPost. He and two others close to Trump or the White House who confirmed Kushner’s interest in the position did so on condition of anonymity to discuss the president’s staffing considerations freely.

    Trump should be looking at Ted Nugent.

  6. 6.

    pinacacci

    Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas time. McCartney should be chained down and showered with tomatoes for that one.

  8. 8.

    bobbo

    There is only one approved Christmas song. “Christmas Wrapping” by the Waitresses. Everything else is torture.

  9. 9.

    randy khan

    It’s probably got to be “The Little Drummer Boy,” but I could make an argument for “Do You Hear What I Hear?”

    I have an odd fondness for “Christmas in Hollis,” by Run-DMC, which was on the first Very Special Christmas album. Part of it is the video, because they seemed to be having so much fun.

  13. 13.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    Christmas songs that are not Christmas songs drive me mad. I used to listen to a local radio station that started to play “Christmas songs” from Thanksgiving onwards. Prime example was A weird song that “mentioned” “lit up like a Christmas tree” in it but had absolutely nothing to do with Christmas. Ditto “Greensleeves” nothing to do with Christmas. I am assuming because the song was later adapted to be a Christmas song, but other than that no clue.

  14. 14.

    chopper

    What’s your choice for the very worst Christmas/holiday musical torture.

    “happy holiday” by andy fucking williams. ugh.

  15. 15.

    Anotherlurker

    “Step Right Up”, by Tom Waits, is my favorite Xmas song.
    “Suddenly Its Christmas” by Laudon Wainright III is the best intro to the Xmas Season.

  16. 16.

    C Stars

    @randy khan: Do You Hear What I Hear is awful, just mind-grating.

    For Holiday music I generally enjoy low-key noodling acoustic or celtic-y stuff, but when it verges into New Age melodramatic female warbling in the higher register I want to shoot the speaker. This has happened several times recently with Spotify holiday music stations. Mr. Stars insists that Spotify is what all the cool kids have but I actually prefer Pandora’s algorithm. Anyhoo… Anyone planning on ingesting some fine drinkables/edibles and watching Pee Wee’s Playhouse Christmas Special sometime in the next two weeks? Cuz I sure am.

  17. 17.

    sukabi

    @eclare: think of it this way, that entire festering boil of a family can be rounded up in one swoop if he actually picks Jared….

    I had an unrelated comment disappear into the ether.?

  19. 19.

    jl

    Not Christmas related, but as long as Bach came up on this almost top 10,000 full service blog, my Christmas present to all my beloved BJ commenters is a link to the PDQ Bach classic, Bach Protrait

    This…. Is what Jack Bach said…..

    Bach Portrait
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtW7cu56MRs

    As for Christmas music, I heard there is a flap about the non-Christmas ‘Christmas’ tune ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’. Supposed to be sexist. I’ve never listened to the words carefully, so I have to go check it out when I remember. But, in general, I am down on many non-Christmas tunes that have been adopted for Christmas, because they mention snow and a fireplace, or have a ‘Christmassy’ feel to the chord progression, or mention reindeer farts, or whatever.

  21. 21.

    Yutsano

    @sukabi:

    think of it this way, that entire festering boil of a family can be rounded up in one swoop if he actually picks Jared….

    There will have to be SOOOOO many waivers to let Jared take that job. I could definitely see someone like Mattis saying aww hell naw at that appointment and bugging out.

  24. 24.

    opiejeanne

    I like a lot of Michael Jackson’s music but there is an album of Christmas songs recorded by Michael when he was a kid that makes me want to cry it’s so awful and screechy. I have put back merchandise and walked out of stores because of that, and I’ve asked the clerks how they can stand to work in a building with that on loop. .

  25. 25.

    Mp

    “Do They Know It’s Christmas” is awful. “Presents for Christmas” by Solomon Burke and “Christmas Time in Washington” by Steve Earle bound my Yuletide moods. Love ‘em both.

  27. 27.

    RSA

    @randy khan:

    I have an odd fondness for “Christmas in Hollis,” by Run-DMC, which was on the first Very Special Christmas album.

    I’m sentimental, and a couple of tracks on that album are my favorite covers: The Pretenders, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, and U2, Baby Please Come Home.

  30. 30.

    laura

    @pinacacci: THAT! It is so very awful, really awful, and in my last glamorous grocery store career. It played every 20 or 30 minutes, around the clock, no escape. Bad enough during the busy shopping day, but on the night crew….can’t, I just can’t.

  33. 33.

    EBT

    I listen to the Howard Phillip Lovecraft Historical Society’s holiday albums.

    All I want for Christmas is my sanity
    I saw mommy kissing Yog Shoggoth
    Freddy the red brained Mi-Go
    And all the other holiday classics we grew up with.

  35. 35.

    John Revolta

    Ohhh fuck APOCALYPSO ALERT

    LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Keith Richards, the hard-partying lead guitarist of the Rolling Stones, has quit drinking – almost – saying he “just got fed up with it.”

    “It’s been about a year now,” Richards told Rolling Stone magazine in an interview. “I pulled the plug on it. I got fed up with it.”

    Richards, 74, who has said his favorite tipple for decades has been whiskey or vodka, said he still had a glass of wine occasionally and a beer.

    “It was time to quit. Just like all the other stuff,” he told the magazine, referring to his past addiction to cocaine, heroin and other hard drugs.

    Been nice knowin’ yez…………

  36. 36.

    The Midnight Lurker

    Best Christmas music? Beethoven’s Ninth. See it live if ever you can. Your hairs will stand up during the choral movement.
    Worst Christmas Music? Anything Muzak.

  38. 38.

    pat

    I scrolled quickly through the responses, and didn’t notice anyone mentioning the DREADFUL arrangements played in every grocery store and drugstore, usually loudest in the produce section and near the photo section in Walgreen’s when one is attempting to organize a calendar at the kiosk without running screaming from the store.
    I hate all music piped into stores (WHY do they have to do it) but Christmas is the absolute worst.

  41. 41.

    MoxieM

    Well, the Phil Spector Xmas Album for both: love the music; person is obvs detestable.

    Gotta go listen now…

  42. 42.

    Mr. Prosser

    The aging soprano in the choir who, every year, sings a solo O Holy Night at the Christmas Eve service

  43. 43.

    FlyingToaster

    Right now I’m having to deal with the fact that I’m a very bad parent, because WarriorGirl does not actually know the tunes to most XMas carols and is having to learn them — and not simple versions — on violin.

    Her teacher starting singing “Deck the Halls” to her, and she was like, “huh?” They don’t learn them at her school.

    I only know them because despite my old Jewish neighborhood, we had to sing them in the (public) school Christmas pageant every year. Even though I can’t fucking sing. In any language (thank you high school German).

    I learned the tunes from playing them on (redacting the list of instruments because it’s fucking tedious). And I’m sure my parents suffered, since they had 4 of us, on 2-4 instruments apiece over the years, learning these.

  44. 44.

    xcentrikdb

    Y’all are forgetting “Jingle Bell Rock”, the words to which appear to been composed via dartboard.

  45. 45.

    Steve in the ATL

    @FlyingToaster: the child of a good parent knows “Christmas Rapping” by the Waitresses and “Christmas in Hollis” by Run-DMC, and prefers the Keith Richards cover of Chuck Berry’s “Run, Run Rudolph”.

    No one cares about the baby boomer songs that have been overplayed for decade after decade.

  46. 46.

    Karen

    I can’t stand “Grandma Got Runnover by a Reindeer. I hear it every year and I hate it.

    I love “Christmas in Sarajevo” by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.

    And I love the soundtrack of “A Charlie Brown Christmas”

  47. 47.

    d504b

    The worst xmas song by far is ‘the little drummer boy’ ! No mention of him in the christian bible and if there was a drummer in that stable- someone would have told him to stop it as it was disturbing the baby.
    But there is one good/cool version on the Asleep At The Wheel’s “M erry Texas Christmas, Y’all’ about a “Swingin’ Drummer Boy”.

    As another one who works in retail, one way to clear the ears is to listen to Graham Parker’s ‘Christmas is for mugs’ (on his Christmas Cracker disc), along with him & Nona Hendryx singing ‘Soul Christmas’.

    One my my faves in xmas music is “A John Prine Christmas” who makes “I saw mommy kissing santa claus’ almost lewd. Such fun!

  52. 52.

    wkwv

    I’m commenting, so the thread must be dead. Twenty years ago, I worked for a notorious big box retailer, and from Thanksgiving until Christmas Day the ‘in store radio station’ played a three hour loop of Christmas songs. If your shift was from 3PM to 11PM- which meant until the asst. manager released you from aisle straightening duty at 2AM, you heard the same set of songs four times a day. I always disliked Little Drummer Boy, and got heartily sick of Jingle Bell Rock, but the one that drove me to almost tear my waist-length hair out was Winter Wonderland! Blasé Rat Pack crooners, Pop artists, even the Queen of Soul herself couldn’t make it sound genuine. Dolly Parton almost pulled it off (and other than Johnny Cash I wasn’t much for country) because she can sing giddily without being too out of character. Winter Wonderland played a small part in ending my four year retail career. I couldn’t face another Christmas at the cash register.

  53. 53.

    RAM

    “Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas” by Burl Ives. Love Ives, but the downtown business owners’ played that thing over and over and over and over again and one of the speakers was right outside the newspaper office where I was trying to write news stores, a couple editorials, and my damned column every week and it nearly drove me to blow the damned speaker away with my trusty Brown Bess.

  56. 56.

    jackmac

    ‘Little Drummer Boy’ is the worst, worst, worst. But Andy Williams’ “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year’ is giving the little drummer brat a run for his money.

    Lot’s of contenders for best. When not overplayed, Leroy Anderson’s ‘A Christmas Festival’ is a favorite. It’s a nice combination of secular and religious. But I’m biased since both of my kids performed it with their choruses at high school holiday concerts, an event which always nicely captured the holiday spirit.

  57. 57.

    Salty Sam

    My first wife passed away 4 days before Christmas in 1999- two days before she passed, with the knowledge that her passing was coming and inevitable, I spent the evening with my two young sons in a mall, “shopping” before I had to take them to a friend’s home to try to break the news of the the horrible reality that they were about to experience. It was like a bad acid trip, in that mall, with decorations and all that music. I remember hearing Andy Williams singing “It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the Year” while I was trying to compose in my head how I was going to tell my boys that their mom was going to be dead in a couple of days. I remember feeling like I was being turned inside out in front of the Food Court in the mall.

    That was then and this is now. “It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year” is my hands down favorite “bad” Christmas song.

  58. 58.

    Juju

    O can’t stand “Little Drummer Boy”, and “Do you hear what I hear?”. Also on that list is that Manfred Steamroller crap. That’s enough to make me pull my hair out. Also “I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas” song. Bleh. I do like that Christmas bells thing.

  61. 61.

    Ol'Froth

    The song I dread hearing this time of year is John Lennon’s “Merry Christmas/War is Over. The song itself is fine, but the screeching children “singing” at the end is just awful.

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