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Christmas Music
I feel like the only person who's not utterly sick of all of it. I think it's nice.
Comments
All good things in moderation, really.
Sometimes it's just everywhere, but it's really not that bad.
^^You're not alone, apparently. There is a year-long Christmas music station.
Some of it is nice. Especially the more religious songs and performances, actually. Songs like "Hark! the Herald Angel Sings", "Gloria in Excelsis Deo" ("Angels We Have Heard on High"), "Child of the Poor" in duet with "What Child Is This?"), "Joy to the World", and many more.
(It helps that Mendelssohn wrote "Hark!" and Handel wrote "Joy to the World".)
On the other hand, the non-religious Christmas songs are on par a bit more meh. Maybe it's partly because they've remixed to hell and back in these vaguely-pop-ish versions. Think, like, every rendition of "Jingle Bells" that you'll hear (assuming it's not a hamhanded a cappella version or one you yourself are playing). You just get a bunch of pop and Broadway showtune influences, with oh-so-emotional strings and maybe an occasional random electric guitar and drum set somewhere to appeal to teenagers. They're...very cheapening.
The biggest offender in this category is "Jingle Bell Rock". That song is...like, commercialized Christmas in a nutshell. Its swing rhythm and showtune-like melody practically scream "stylishness" and "fashionableness", basically turning the whole season into social status one-upsmanship.
"Little Drummer Boy" usually has better-than-average remixes, though.
You know what's more annoying than Christmas music? Jingle noises. They're fuckin' everywhere and it's like Instant Christmas Just Add Jingles Noises. It's THAT shallow.
^I'm not religious, but religious music, as compared to more generic holiday music, tends to be very genuine.
I'm with CU on this one. Christmas jingles come across as cynical to me, but religious Christmas music is nice because it feels heartfelt. It's been six odd years since I was Catholic, but that kind of thing is still kind of comforting.
Little known fact: I attend mass to enjoy the music.
Anyway, relevant:
It's like a remix of Jingle Bell Rock and the DKC theme.
Echoing Alex and CU, I remember when I was young there was a commercial for a Christian music CD that would pop up every Christmas, and would play a lovely rendition of "Amazing Grace".
"Jingle Bell Rock" can go fuck itself though.
Agreed with people like CU.
Noel is still my favorite.
It should come as no surprise that "Jingle Bell Rock" was written by an ad man who wanted to cash in on the then-recent popularity of rock-'n'-roll. It's sort of like writing a "jingle bell rap" to take advantage of that genre's recent popularity.
I love Christmas-themed music. I love newer stuff and I love genuine classical holiday music. Hate Bing Crosby though.
My favorite are humorous ones though.
And fandom remixes of the 12 Days of Christmas will never stop amusing me.
> Hate Bing Crosby though.
For some reason I have never liked that slight-jazz pop/swingy style with those oh-so-charismatic guys like Sinatra singing.
I mean, that's not to say it's bad, but it's never really appealed to me very much.
(Though I still prefer Sinatra's rendition of "Fly Me to the Moon" over anything appearing in Evangelion.)
^ "The Twelve Days of Christmas" is so perfectly built for mutation.
I do like Mariah Carey's 'All I Want For Christmas Is You', though.
Although my favorite is 'God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen'.
There's a couple songs I like. Father Christmas by The Kinks. Christmas at Ground Zero by Weird Al.
Also, I like the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.
I really hate Christmas music, regardless of if it's sacred or secular, jazzy or choral. I couldn't tell you how much of this is from oversaturation or me just not liking the styles, but it's at the point where there's literally only one Christmas song I can think of that I like.
In Serbia, Christmas is a low-key religious holiday, while the commercialized "Santa and presents" stuff is reserved for New Year.
One of the consequences is that there are almost no holiday songs, since Christmas is as low-key as it is and New Year doesn't make good lyrics material, which is a great thing as holiday songs are annoying.
Any actual Christmas songs that are played on the TV and the like are usually contemporary musical arrangements set to religious lyrics, fairly solemn and dignified (such as this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rNIuPnPiCo). Unlike some Catholic tunes, Orthodox church music is far from what you'd call easy-listening.
Put me in the group that does not care for most Christmas music. I don't mind choral stuff or parodies but I find the rest either highly annoying or dull.
Mostly it's just the oversaturation that bugs me, but fuck Jingle Bell Rock sideways with a cactus. It wasn't as bad this year because my town had a bit of a local revolution on the matter where most stores refused to put up much Christmas stuff until after Thanksgiving for once, but over the last decade or so as we were hitting critical mass you were getting stuff drilled into your ears from mid-October until long after New Years'.
The ones from church are considerably better, but I'm still kind of bitter about caroling days in band when the songs were ALL written in E-flat and ended on the exact same chord. It'd be fine if our church didn't have a terrible choir and a congregation so half-assed that I'm one of maybe ten people in the building bothering to sing at all, and one of five anywhere near on key. I mean, bad singing tends to balance out a bit in a crowd, but a handful of exposed voices is just...eurgh.
We usually get a rendition of this from one of our really good singers though.
The only song I like is Frosty the Snowman besides that I hate Christmas songs.
IJBM: Working in a store means that I have Christmas music I hate stuck in my head, even though it's my day off.
Frosty the Snowman is also pretty nice. Though usually only when sung by children.
Christmas songs are just okay by default. It's the endless renditions that come out every year that piss me off. It's Oh! Exploitable!: The Genre.
I don't mind Christmas music in general. I actually kinda like it. When I've had a stressful year (and damn has 2012 been stressful for me) it's nice to sort of indulge in Christmas as a way of saying "fuck the world, it's time to celebrate for a while" and I find Christmas music is a good way to immerse myself in that.
That said, one thing that does get my goat is people doing covers of songs when they could never do justice to the original. Next person who attempts "Run Rudolph Run" gets smacked.
Also: covers that supplant their original recordings for no apparent reason. Why is it that stations always play Kelly Clarkson's version of "Grown-Up Christmas List" instead of Amy Grant's? (The song itself is sappy as hell, and I should hate it, but for reasons I can't explain I'm kinda fond of it. I dunno.)
I have the opposite problem.
Unless I am listening to an Oldies station I should pretty much never be hearing Elvis Presley on the radio. There's nothing wrong with him or his music, but it's just not where it belongs.
... huh?
The one that tends to play Christmas music around here actually is the Oldies station, which would explain why the exact opposite bugs me. :P
Even if I don't normally like Christmas music, I've always loved this one.
Centie, it's because the Amy Grant version is more than ten years old, silly
Oh, right. It occupies that odd space where it's too old to be "recent" but not yet old enough to be "classic".