December 23, 2013 by Erin

The Worst Christmas Songs

This will not come as a shock, but I love Advent and Christmas. It really is the perfect time of year for someone with a pensive, sappy, traditional, and slightly liturgical bent. This season is so much about moments. It’s really the only time of year the culture at large seems to be attune to most of the things that are especially important to me: relationships, contemplation, remembering, ambience, experience, food, and, of course, art.

Music is an especially meaningful artform for many during this time of year, and everyone has their favorite songs. I have a few perennial standards (“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” by Amy Grant and “The Christmas Song” by Nat King Cole … duh), but usually one song will really grab me every year. A few years ago it was “It Came upon a Midnight Clear.” Last year it was “Still, Still, Still.” This year it seems to be “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing” (Shout out to my boy Charles Wesley). I mean, really. Consider, if you will, the following lyrics:

Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel
Hark! The herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!

There’s so much richness, so much depth, so much to think about. Christmas invites us to ponder, and much of the season’s music taps into that invitation.

Which is why it pains me to turn on nearly any Christmas radio station and hear lyrics like, “The party’s on, the feelin’s here, that only comes, this time of year.” (Brilliant, Sir Paul. Just brilliant.) The truth is, there’s a lot of crappy Christmas music out there. And, correct me if I’m wrong here, but it seems like those crappy classics are the ones that get played ad nauseum. I mean like, if I hear “Last Christmas” one more time, I’m in serious danger of going crazy and throwing my gifts out a fourth story window (or your gifts, more likely). Amiright?

And so, in the spirit of the season, I give you my top 6 least favorite Christmas songs ever. Some are worse than others, but all tap into the obscure and misguided notion that people love to be sonically annoyed while fighting mall traffic.

6. “Wonderful Christmastime”
“Simply” is right. I think Paul McCartney was just like, “You know what, creativity is difficult and overrated. Let’s write a repetitive an inane Christmas song.” Well done, Sir. Well done.

5. “Happy Xmas (War is Over)”
Former Beatles just should not have written Christmas songs in the 70s. Who approved that? Also, it’s really great John and Yoko didn’t sell out and make commercial music or anything.

4. “Do You Hear What I Hear?”
Yes, I heard you! Just shut up already!

3. “The Christmas Shoes”
No comment.

2. “The Little Drummer Boy”
You’re probably picking up on the fact that repetition is not my favorite thing. So any song in which every other line is “pa rum pum pum pum” is not going to fly. This one also gets put on the shelf with “Away in a Manger” for making a saccharine joke of the manger scene. Not to mention those weird sopranos.

1. ”Feliz Navidad”
THIS IS THE WORST CHRISTMAS SONG EVER. I actually get angry when I hear the first few notes. I just … I just can’t.

It’s just dawned on me what my worst nightmare would be: the little drummer boy shows up on my doorstep wearing Christmas shoes and asks, “Do you hear what I hear? The war is over! Now we’re simply having a wonderful Christmastime. Feliz Navidad! (pa rum pum pum pum)”

Merry Christmas, friends. May these next few days be filled with all the best things. At least try to dodge “Christmas Shoes” if you can.