OCTOBER 2, 2015 – DECEMBER 5, 2015
Some ‘other’ holiday/Christmas crossovers: Oktoberfest, Columbus Day, (6 days of) Halloween, Veterans’ Day, Thanksgiving, Black Friday… But this MOSTLY was the Fifty Days of ‘Merica-mus. At least one holiday song celebrating each state.
DECEMBER 6 – 13, 2015
Chanukah/Hannukah songs. Some good ones.
DECEMBER 14 – 23, 2015
Caroldies: the best parodies of traditional carols. OK, a few of the weirdest.
DECEMBER 24, 2015
Over 30 songs about Christmas Eve. Exhaustive.
DECEMBER 25, 2015
My top ten fave novelty Christmas songs (for where i’m at right now).
DECEMBER 26-30, 2015
Parodeus: some pretty cool pieces of secular, popular music revised to be sung about Christmas topics. What a country!
DECEMBER 31, 2015
Over 20 songs about New Year’s Eve. Still one of the twelve days of.
JANUARY 1. 2016
Not quite 20 songs about New Year’s resolutions. Ha!
JANUARY 2-5, 2016
Odd, sloppy mop up of Christmas songs connected to U.S. territories in order to be anal about the 50 states thing. (See that post.)
The rest of JANUARY 2016
Science fiction Christmas novelty songs!
6 – 10: Dr. Who 11-15: Star Wars 16 – 19: Star Trek 20: Other TV 21 – 24: aliens 25 – 29: outer space 30 – 31: robots
FEBRUARY 2016
Love, love, love songs (about Christmas).
MARCH 2016
Mild naughtiness! 1 – 5: flatulence 6 – 12: micturition 13 – 18: feces 19 – 21: “crap” 22 – 31: The S -word
APRIL 2016
Death, killing, violence–all for the holidays! (Including: turkeys [16th], trees [17th], deer [18 – 20], Frank Sinatra [21st], Santa [victim & perpetrator {22 – 28th}], and holiday zombies [29 – 30th].)
MAY 2016
The 1950s in novelty Christmas music! Every three days (or so) features another ordinal year’s crooning, swinging, doo wopping, yodeling, & rocking and rolling.
JUNE 2016
The Animal Kingdom in Christmas song! Don’t look for reindeer, but we will wind up with a manger-full of beasts by the end. (Invertebrates 1st – 6th; dinos 7th; dragons 8th; other myths 9th; amphibians 10th, reptiles 11th, birds 12th – 14th; fish 15th, Australia Day 16th; rodents 17th – 21st; bunnies 22nd; dogs 23rd – 24th; cats 25th – 26th; jungle animals 27th; cows 28th; donkeys 29th; and nativity scene stealers 30th.)
JULY 1 – 15, 2016
Wow, it’s far from Christmas. So a calendar countdown celebrating That Holiday for each month of the year (even December).
JULY 16-31, 2016
I take an interest in pchromatology–not just your Blue Christmas and Dreaming of a White Christmas, but your greens and purples and (oh yeah) whites and blacks. It might get racy.
AUGUST 2016
“You Auto Have a Merry Christmas” roars out of the gate with hot rods, cadillacs, and other cool cars… until the 12th. From the 13th to the 21st we go trucker Christmas, ten-four. Then a few days (i forget how many) of drunk driving, traffic jams, parking lots, and the 31st is just driving home–a time honored holiday tradition.
SEPTEMBER 2016
Elves all month. 1-4 happy happy joy joy; 5- 12 labor complaints (it gets ugly); 13-20 roll call of elf names from Buddy to Twinkle; 21-25 parody party; 26-30 in depth analysis.
OCTOBER 2016
Santa’s other occupations, hobbies, and leanings: from deity to astronaut to president to spy to hippie to lawman to criminal to biker to surfer to lover to perv to family man to cowboy to cashier to coal miner (ha!) to lawyer to impersonator, clone, and myth. Whew.
NOVEMBER 2016
Holly jolly dance time! Waltzing, can-can, two-step, swing, mambo, polka, cha cha, be bop, boogie boogie, jive, rock’n’roll, the twist, the shag, the shimmy, limbo, tango, gangnam style, hokey pokey, disco, and rag. Get up–in a Xmas rhythm!
DECEMBER 1-24+26, 2016
The Christmas List: lyrically enumerating the things wanted for Xmas (no front teeth or hippopotamusses!). Love and sex rear their heads. There’s a great miscellaneous bit on the 24th.
12/25/16 – my 10 favorite videos (that will allow me to link).
DECEMBER 27-31, 2016
The Chanukah List: at least eight goodies craved (no socks) for the Festival of Lights (in song). Maybe a hippopotamus this time.
JANUARY 2017
This American month of Christmas aims to unite all yanquis with musical selections celebrating patriotism, the flag, and ESPECIALLY our troops–the most American thing everybody else around the world knows about us.
FEBRUARY 2017
Time for some mistle-tunes. From parody to cartoon to country to naughty, artists professional and amateur will be waiting, hoping, crying, and groping under that traditional Christmas greenery all month long. (Don’t miss “The Best Mistletoe Song Ever!” buried in the middle of it all.)
MARCH 2017
Jesus is the reason for the season, so rejoice through alternating parabolic parables sung seriously and partying parodies sung sillily about the mother and father, the manger, the heraldic angels, the wisemen, a drummer boy (or two), stars, presents, and the naming of that baby king.
APRIL 2017
Sugar me one more time, baby! Xmas is a time to sweeten the pot with songs about: Candy (2nd-6th); Peppermint (7th); Candy Canes (8th-9th); Chocolate (10th); Baked Goods (11th); Mince Pie (12th-13th); Just Cake (14th-15th); FRUITCAKE (16th -22nd); Cookies (23rd-29th); and finishing off with a round of holiday diabetes (30th). Gulp! Ahhh!
MAY 2017
Time to balance the food groups with all other Christmas comestibles: Breakfast (2nd-3rd); Pancakes (4th); Bread (5th); Sandwiches (6th); Tacos (7th); Burgers (8th); Other Fast Food (9th); All Things Potato (10th); Lunch (11th); Nuts (12th); Popcorn (13th); Italian (14th); Just Pizza (15th); Casserole (16th); Stew (17th); Polish (18th); Scandinavian (19th); Poultry (20th); Pork (21st); Solely Bacon (22nd); Red Meat (23rd); Finally Dinner (24th-30th); & Leftovers (31st)
JUNE 2017
To your health! Christmas drinking songs, starting with froth for all ages: milk, cocoa (1st); hot chocolate (2nd); coffee (3rd); tea (4th); cider (5th); wassail (6th); EGGNOG (7th – 14th–alcohol as an ingredient begins the 11th). Then only adult stuff: hot buttered rum (15th); rum (16th – 17th); vodka (18th); bourbon (19th); scotch (20th); whiskey (21st – 23rd); beer (24th – 26th); gluhwein (27th); wine (28th); champagne (29th); punch (30th).
JULY 2017
Drink, drank, drunk… time to deal with fermented overindulgence. Songs celebrating the intention to get drunk, the overstocked inventory, the beginnings of the hazy daziness, the bravey cravenness, the full-on fighting fugue, the aftermath: including blackouts, drunk tanks, hangovers, and rehab. Then we deal with drunk Santas, reindeer, daddies, jesuses, and elves. Finally, AA and sober holiday carols.
AUGUST 2017
We’re at the gateway of recreationally getting merry, so this month we responsibly trip bells with drugs. Weed (12 days). Cocaine, crack, meth, glue, Xanax, Prozac, L.S.D., acid. It’s not all fun, you know. Last couple days we go cold turkey and try it drug-free. Just say ho.
SEPTEMBER 2017
A month of celebrating celebrities. Not just Santa gets songs about him, you know. (Screen, song, ‘toon, and other fictionals are featured, greeted, and feted).
[1/2 of] OCTOBER 2017
High concept time: songs that Sound Like famous artists, but aren’t them. We calls it ‘Ghost of Christmas Pastiche.’
But… then we couldn’t find but a few of these so the blog lapses into–
[2/2 of] OCT/NOV/DEC 2017, JAN 2018
Parodies’ Paradise. Hits from the charts (the ’50s to Now) reworded with Christmas themed comedy. Oh, the lip syncs you’ll have! [Naturally, 12/25/17 features a best of: in this case, a best from each of the last dozen months or so.]
FEBRUARY 2018
Still cold. So let’s have a snow-down hoe-down or two singing about flakes, falling, angels, balls, banks, and school closures. Is it Xmas? Well, most of these appear on holiday-themed albums, or just want to appeal to many denominations without ruffling feathers.
MARCH 2018
Frosty isn’t the only holiday icon. A week of snowmen kidsong, a week and a half of abominable snowmen songs, a week of pop snowmen songs, and a week of funny snowmen songs. If you build it, it will melt.
APRIL/MAY 2018
Tree this on for size: two months of Xmas evergreen songs. The forest, the need, the lot, the size, the POV, the love, talking trees, Santa, what’s underneath, Christ above, trimming, lighting, ornaments, double meanings, tinsel, angels, stars, the party, dancing, romancing, even closer (!), gifts, family, more symbology, death and removal, evil, aluminum, pot, animalia, weird stuff, and finally no tree after all.
JUNE/JULY 2018
Present and accounted for. June is all about shopping, the countdown ’til Christmas, Black Friday, whether to hit the mall or the second hand store, the angst, the plastic, the poorhouse. The end of June actually wraps up with presentation: paper, ribbons, bows, and boxes. Then we review what you’re getting: me, love, this song about me loving you. Santa’s delivery system is also addressed (to you). Your greed does neither escape notice, you bad kids. The list is read, Chanukah considered, shaking v. opening debated. Finally bad presents, no presents, reactions, returns… and the gift card!
AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2018
The Nativity will be televised! After a couple days of songs ’bout Christmas on TV, we start with the really early ’60s and scrutinize the series that created America (mostly cartoons) and their occasional Christmas tune. This will certainly touch upon novelty holiday albums by entire casts (how many did The Flintstones release? The answer may surprise you). We’ll also wallow in the well of pop prime time that ‘discovers’ new artists and drape their music in the background for dramatic effect. (Some good stuff.) No flipping!
OCTOBER 2018
Navel gazing introspection with Christmas songs about Christmas songs. Singing about singing, singing about writing, singing about how bad carols are–how this song is just another song. Incestuous inside jokes abound.
NOVEMBER 2018
Time to pour a stiff cup o’ cocoa, unspool the stamps, and roll out the Christmas cards. Songs about the cards, the sentiments, the list, and–even the 21st Century updates: texting, tweeting, and facebooking. Just to stay in touch.
DECEMBER 2018
Don We Now samples the songs about dressing for the holidays: mittens, boots, SWEATERS, and underwear (crossdressing, too). There may be a Santa suit (part of it under your girlfriend’s bed). And then there’s socks or a tie for your actual gift. Thanks, Gramma.
JANUARY 2019
Let me count the ways you are now SICK of Christmas… 27. From exhaustion to the flu to measles to heart attacks and finally (serious STDs detour) to cancer, all maladies come to call for the holidays. Barforama.
FEBRUARY 2019
Sick and tired and pissed off, just a bit. Let’s dive deep into detestation. Hating Christmas may be petty, pretty, pretentious, or prestigious dependent on your target. Mad at the fat man, sick of songs, lashing out at loneliness, let’s embrace Anti-Christmas (hello, Satan!), gripe with the Grinch, and scat with Scrooge. Then, maybe… forgive. (Sigh.)
MARCH 2019
BLUEST ALERT! Corralled up all the F-word songs about Xmas into one morass. Yes, there’s hate (still), but also passionate, unbridled expression. P.S. Check out all my clever versions of the four letters as acronym as titles of entries.
APRIL 2019
…along those lines, we finally BLUE ALERT!!! drop an ear to songs about sexual expression for the holidays. From desire, to genitals, to auto-oral-anal-vaginal. We even float Santa or Mommy as targets. Then, freeforall.
MAY 2019
ReduX-mas! Encore in the city with songs i’ve discovered long after topics had been closed. From ‘MerriCa-Mas to Don We Now loads of keepers and time wasters. Hoo-way!
JUNE 2019
You’re breaking my heart for Christmas! Songs about suspicion, getting dumped, getting even, being lonely, and moving on. Busy time of the year.
JULY 2019
Family time! Holidays attract far flung relatives together like lime gelatin attracts fruit shards. There’s love and other stuff (including drinking, rivalry, passive-aggressive dysfunction, and violence). Gather all!
AUGUST 2019
Time off to consider our options… what other holidays do we have this time of year? Naturally there’s the mash-ups (Christmas-hanuk-kwanza-solstice-yammas, or what have you) through the fourth, Kwanzaa until the tenth, Boxing Day to the fifteenth, Festivus as far as the twentieth, Saturnalia for a day, drawing out Solstice stuff unto the twenty-seventh, finishing up with Buy-Nothing-Day, and all the antithetical protesty noise. Save room for the Flying Spaghetti Monster on the thirty-first.
SEPTEMBER 2019
How easy can it be to be the Missus to the Saint? Santa’s wife gets a monthlong visit with songs about how they met, how cool she is, how lonely she is one night of the year (yes, there’s some naughty bits, because… well, guys are dawgs), and perhaps some psychotic breaks as well. What hashtag shall we choose?
OCTOBER 2019
Well, the elephant in the manger is The War on Christmas, a popular polemic to part ways over the holiday dinner table… excuse me, i mean Christmas feast in honor of Jesus. Both sides are represented with boodles of snark.
NOVEMBER 2019
Party people come on & celebrate! Xmas festivities begin now with who to invite, what to dance to, and how lame to be–that is, intoxicated. Special Santa past-times and office get-togethers, too.
DECEMBER 2019
An historical recreation of technological inventions to help with Christmas. From writing to jukeboxes to atom bombs and faxes, all the best ways to give JC the attaboy is sung about. Remember, these aren’t songs performed on the internet, these are songs about Xmas on the internet! (Except TikTok, can’t find carols about that yet.)
JANUARY 2020
Merry Criminals acknowledges the breaking of laws around the time of the pulling of crackers. Songs about shoplifting, grand theft sleigh, bank heists, stalking, mugging, domestic abuse, escalating to (sorry!) rape and murder. On Christmas. Then jail, prison, parole, lawyers, breakouts, and even reformation.
FEBRUARY 2020
Here’s a dumb idea: songs about being born the same day as Jesus Christ. Bothers some, but will their cries of injustice appeal to the rest of us? Also songs about Newtonmas (Isaac was born 12/25), and Jimmy Buffett (ditto), and even some bee-day shout outs to the big Jay-by.
MARCH 2020
Yipee-kai-lalujah, cowboys like Christmas (and singing) too. Plenty of carols by the Old Corral. Drive them doggies on by and strum a spell.
APRIL 2020
Coal for Christmas. It’s been a bad year, so Santa’s digging out the Big Black and putting your name on it. Maybe that’s okay with you. But–it’s a label.
MAY 2020
Nothing for Christmas. Worse than coal! Someone forgot, or misspelled, or transposed address digits–or maybe, just maybe, junior, you were that bad.
JUNE 2020
No Christmas at all.
JULY 2020
Bells for Christmas. Some traditional-type carols ring a bell, but parodies, danceables, and the odd rap chimes out.
AUGUST 2020
Star(s) for Christmas. Pew tunes of old and new harken back to that big ol’ divine spotlight. To get weird, we’ll call Santa a star, too. Maybe even go to the stars….
SEPTEMBER 2020
Lights for Christmas. Now, we’ve decorated trees before here at the home blog. But, we’ll light a candle (or eight!), a fireplace, or a fancy show as well.
OCTOBER 2020
The Mall Santa. From humble beginnings on the sidewalk with the kettle, our big, fat target gets the treatment. And, we’ll hear what he thinks of your kids as well. In song!
NOVEMBER 2020
It’s almost Christmas. Songs about how the holiday is just around the corner. Tick tock.
DECEMBER 2020
That last pairs nicely with Proximity for Christmas, songs about the uncomfortable to exhilarating anxiety about how Christmas is… not… quite… here… yet. How does that make you feel?
JANUARY 2021
Then we get to the afterwards, with the words ‘after’ and ‘over’ and ‘gone’ and songs about cleaning up and getting over it and presuming there’ll be something else next year….
FEBRUARY 2021
Stuttering off that After Christmas theme, artists good and bad, young and bold will remind you that Xmas returns. Here it comes AGAIN.
MARCH 2021
Leaching off that Christmas Again idea, the presentations offering include another Christmas, and another Xmas, and another Yuletide, and another holiday…. It may never end.
APRIL 2021
Used up the calendar’s befores and afters, so something new: holla out to Xmas with interjections, exclamations, and much shouting. We’ll cover hello, hey, hurrah, hallelujah, whoa, gee, OMG, oh, gosh, golly, yes, and goodbye. To/about Christmas. Yabba-dabba.
MAY – AUGUST 2021
It’s finally reindeer time. The first three weeks are individual songs about each of the great eight of Santa’s pullers. Then three days of ensemble songs. Then, yes, a week about the rosy-nosey one. Then come the OTHER reindeer, from Adolph to Bubba to Jesus to Marvin to Ringo to Tootles. Six weeks of those jokers! Next, regular reindeer romps about their training, loving, noises, misbehavior, and trophies to finish off July. August is about the flight zone: those hoofy guys, the sleigh, Santa’s other means, crashing, angels, and that connection you missed in San Antonio trying to get home for the holidays… dammit.
SEPTEMBER 2021 – DECEMBER 2022
Countdown to Christmas begins at infinity and quantifies the holiday feeling from billions to millions to thousands–at which point (second week of October 2021) something occurs: the year mark at Xmas denotes a mark of history, nostalgia, tragedy, and family. Some amazing insights, gang. Lotta rap (which has code numbers for weapons, ‘hoods, and crime). Tried to keep each numeral to 50 songs or less, but some get more than a week of entries: 100, 50, 25, 12 [oh no!!], 10. Every song must include enumeration in title or lyric. Three… two… one… go!
JANUARY 2023
Hang 10, Big Daddy! We’re surfing for Christmas! Or Santa is!. Some songs are repeats, and not all stay aloft. But when boards and yule match tidal currents… magic happens.
FEBRUARY 2023
Forget surfing! Now we’re sledding! (No sleighs! No!) (But a toboggan would be cool.)
MARCH 2023
Did i say sleds?! I meant skates! What a great way to meet cute and/or know that it’s love! And the metaphoric value of this homespun activity is fun on ice!
APRIL 2023
Starting to get a bit warm. Still, there IS skiing. Okay, honestly, i’m scraping the bottom of the slopes here and have begun to add instrumentals. It’s all downhill from here.
MAY 2023
Let’s change the modes of transportation now from slippery to mass. Christmas Trains are definitely a thing. From getting home (usually late), to Santa’s alternative to sleighing (what a powerhouse), to that cute li’l ol’ decoration that goes around the base of the tree (ever try that?)–these locomotives move us.
JUNE 2023
From shore to sea to the briny deeps, ships bear us toward our destiny. Be that a Merry Christmas or a Caribbean pit stop only time will tell. Sailors ahoy.
JULY 2023
Where there’s ships there may be pirates. Pirate Christmas songs may then follow. Not many, but boy those guys know how to shanty.
AUGUST 2023
Cryptid-mas time! Monsters come in all shapes and sizes, and some of them feature into Christmas songs. Aliens, Bigfoot, Chupacabra, Cthulhu, Dracula, Dragons, Frankenstein’s monster, Ghosts, Gnomes, Goblins, Godzilla, Gremlins, Jacob Marley, Krampus, Mari Lwyd, the Universal Monsters, Orcs, Robots, Unicorns, Vampires, Werewolves, Witches, Yeti, and Zombies oh my!
SEPTEMBER – OCTOBER 2023
Unholy nights! For perhaps an extension of supernatural beings from the previous months, we pull up the asbestos gloves and deal with demons, devils, Satan, Hell (and its minions), Armageddon, and just plain ol’ DAMN this and DAMN that. Sin-along with the groups!
NOVEMBER 2023
The Worst Christmas Ever is a personal take on bad gifts, guest, girls & boys, and just life in general. What does it take to ruin your holidays? Could it be your heightened expectations?! Lower ’em! Or take solace in these songs.
DECEMBER 2023
Wrapped and presented? What about locked and loaded? Guns for Christmas gets sung for and against. Naughty or nice really matters now!
JANUARY 2024
There’s no business like a show Christmas! Musicals about the holidays (or maybe just Xmas) hit the boards and take a bow. Lots of Scrooge in here, but there will be Jesus, too. Places, please!
FEBRUARY 2024
I finally do my duty and contribute Novelty Christmas Songs of my own design. Set ’em to music if you like (i couldn’t possibly as i am not capable that way). Subjects vary from nostalgia to nonsense, prosody to parody. What do you think?