The hoary tradition of the plateful of cookies by the chimney is only enhanced by everyone eating the special made spritz and platzchen hand over hand until the holidays are past. Oh, whew, let me catch my breath.
The monster novelty (read mainstream) Christmas songs here are:
“Christmas Cookies” by George Strait and everyone else in the entire country music hemisphere who wants an aw shucks gee whiz addition to their yule oeuvre. It’s cute. All those other covers basically ape George. The only variations i like for their variety are the R W Hampton (and kids) batch for adding just a pinch of honky tonk, and the Hadley Holloway and Gregory Fisher half-dozen for their swing/early rock joy.
“‘Til Santa’s Gone (Milk & Cookies)” by Clint Black. This one doesn’t have the legs of the the 1990s Strait classic, but it gets down home and five-years-old and tells a story. It twerks country music the wrong way, overusing the choochoo harmonica, formatted after the musical show-stopper, but gee-golly does it bake for me.
And now the least worst of the fruitcake songs. The nut-laden finale–until we move on to the most popular baked Christmas sweet of them all.
Rum cake gets boxed in here, best portrayed in riddim by The Barefoot Man’s “Rum Cake.” Hic! Nearly is impressive is rumcakes.org’s “Rum Cakes.” Hypnotetically repetitive. And folky. Also mercantiley Lisa of Lisa’s Rum Cakes sings “Lisa’s Rum Cake Song” as a commercial for her seasonal product. Okay.
Back to our featured baked good.
12Stone Worship offers up Xian young men of the hiphop persuasion to praise the Christmastide, while side slamming our target with “Spread Love, Not the Fruitcake.” Fresh (yeah, without the exclamation point, tha’s wha-yime-sighin’). Big mixedmedia finish, though.
I’ve already squiched in Lauren Mayer’s “The Fruitcake That Ate New Jersey.” That was more than a year ago, so another song-story-time for this overbaked orchestration.
Finally a song parody about fruitcake! Master comic-caroler Dave Rudolf growls out “Fruitcakes for Christmas,” to ‘Silver Bells’ elvis style. Okay, mostly fun.
Pretty as twinkling lights is 1000 Clowns mellowly rapping “I Hate Fruitcake” available from all i can tell only on the KROQ Christmas fund-raiser. I don’t begrudge the boys hate when they sing like angels who were high.
The sticky crumbs here… angry, mean songs about fruitcake with some redeeming graces.
Some old schoolhouse rock ripoff about fruitcake rounded the web a while back and at least one troller posted half of this nice calypso number (without any laffs in it) as “The Fruit Cake Song.” It had possibility….
Another “Fruitcake Song” of uncertain origin backs prepubescent pajama wearing ballerina-wannabes in some outdoor park festival. It kinds pops, what you can hear of it.
The Wissman Family and The Von Trapp Children (grandkids of the original Austrian Kurt) kid around with “Please Don’t Send Me Fruitcake.” Oldsters sneer at the sentiment but approve of the youthful exuberance. Adorable!
Local holiday revue with neighbor talent only embellishes “Holiday Lament (Nobody Likes a Fruitcake)” from That Time of Year. This time it’s from the point of view of the maligned mealy loaf, at least that side of the table. Great harmonies, girls!
One repetitive gag for the good ol’ fruitcake song is the receptive concept of regifting this puppy. Spoiler alert: you give it away forever! You might get it back! It’s in the postal system for eternity! Heangh-hrrou!
Plank Road Publishing has an entry here.”Everlasting Fruitcake” is a bit more fast paced than their usual careful constipation for dumb little kids. I could dance to this one.
Pat Boone is so old by now we can’t tell if he’s phoning it in, or if he’s being puppeteered by greedy descendants when he sings (makes up) “The Fruitcake.” Give the geezer credit, with this ratatat listing of everyone who regifts, he’s going for stroke.
The San Francisco Gay Men’s Choir whoop it up with “Recycle the Fruitcake.” The pageant is the thing wherein we’ll lampoon every queer stereotype with a winkity-wink in-on-it we can flounce it and you’ll never really get it costume excess-roy. Hoo boy.
Duck Logic Comedy overplays the joke with “The Fruitcake (I Hate Fruitcake).” And it takes half the song to get to the revolving part of the joke. But more musical talent than humor wins out here.
Like lines at Disneyland, mothers-in-law, and foul-mouthed children, fruitcake is the lazy man’s joke–presuming, assuming, and subsuming a cultural unspoken menace that is spoken. Some of these jokesongs are wastes of time.
But what else are we gonna do?
“The Fruitcake Song” has been passed around to churches and artists of some talent, but Kirk Talley hits the nail on the head with his wokka-wokka zip-zing smirking hamminess. It’s funny to somebody that sneaking this gift to the dog ‘would be a sin.’ I guess. Yawn.
Bill Engvall must have whiplash from patting himself on the back so hard for his “Fruitcake Makes Me Puke.” He’s run a punchline into a three minute country song that has to be a holiday hit cause he said so.
Dr. Elmo supplies motive for why grandma might be targeted by reindeer with “Grandma’s Killer Fruitcake.” Channeling Ray Stevens adds to the bounciness of this howler, but the quality of the video says it all.
Some supposedly supportive songs on fruitcake are bad numbers on purpose, or they are the so-called left-handed compliment.
The bombast of M. Ryan Taylor’s “Ode to a Fruitcake” makes me suspicious. People don’t usually snigger at operatic recitals, do they?
A couple of street corner blues croakers apply their “Fruitcake Song” lyrics metaphorically to sex. They want some, but not that kind.
Spongebob Squarepants spends a few seconds touting “Hot Fruitcake” on his holiday album. It may be tongue in sponge, however.
Bubble Gum Becky from Mighty Magic Pants explodes “Someone Ate My Fruitcake!” at a high school talent holiday shindig. She wanted that dish, but if you listen carefully, she didn’t. Mold, blah, yada, blah.
Cookie Cutter Girl rocks her “Fruitcake Song” rolling out the cornucopia which includes our humble sweetbread. But little digs here and there make me question her hunger levels. This hails from the annual Seattle drag-comedy holiday revue show ‘Ham for the Holidays.’ It’s your basic show stopper.
Here’s something else you don’t see every day… for the holidays ’15 Oregon Lottery tried a Fruitcake scratch-off which did as well as anything else. Their promos from AdJab featured half songs supposedly from an album [Spirit of Fruitcake vol. 4] including “Not on My Table” (country), “What’s that Fruitcake Doing Under My Tree?” (’70s power ballad), “(The Holidays Aint Nuttin) Without My Fruitcake” (electric funk), and the most positive: “Merry Christmas Fruitcake” (lazy lounge lothario). Hey now!
A mixed beginning, but let us accentuate the positive. Some songs refer to the fruitcake as a good thing all told… at least as good as holly, and rooftop reindeer, and caroling–the standbys we expect.
Disney stands for the traditional: “Toot Suite, Christmas Treats” recites a Goofy-sized list of goodies (including corn flakes) to eat this time of year. Fruitcake is in there too.
Mannheim Steamroller also orchestrates a menu of expected activities for Christmas, including fruitcake with “The Fruitcake Song.” It tags in wacky then runs back to harmony.
Many a high school choir cracks up their audience (parents) with a winter performance of “The Fruitcake Song” which applauds the messy melange. Despite years of the TV show Glee, most of these affairs are clumsy and embarrassing. One Madrigals‘ team styling seems to mock the sincere formula of the song. The kids here are having fun and don’t look stoned at all.
Dead serious, are Eraserheads, ‘The Beatles of the Philippines.’ Their “Fruitcake” is Invasion-tastic, but hardly about the dessert or the December day. And their video is a hard day’s night.
Let’s Devo it up with The Superions. “Fruitcake,” like the most appreciative songs here, lists the ingredients. Done.
Fergha and Robyn are just trying to get a song recorded. It could be about anything. It’s about a suitcase full of fruitcake. “Fruitcake” uplifts. Leave it at that.
On the other hand, fruitcake is where you can get your extra rations of alcohol. Michael Lusk partakes of “Grandma’s Loaded Fruitcake” in a harmless boot-scooting country style. Cheers!
James J. ‘Jimmy’ Wisner aka Kokomo doesn’t care who knows what he loves from gramma in “The Fruitcake Song.” This reggae/folk-style sing-a-long echoes rap styling and I almost feel like contributing a verse when it comes around to me.
Time is nigh to study the most easily identified (or 2nd or so, next to milk and cookies) sweetie mcpetey for the holidays: FURITCAKE.
As early as Roman times, fruits were mixed into sweet dough and baked. But with the advent of cheaper sugar, a preservative of fruits, the ideas of plums and cherries in December became too confectious to pass up. I mean, apart from preserves, you didn’t used to get a good chewy mouth-fructing when the snow piled high. Your insulin missed the rush. It was exciting to get it during dark days.
Today we have world-wide shipping, and freeze drying, and of course tons of canning. When people born around 1900 later became grandmothers they were still churning sugared-fruit laden wheat treats out like they remembered their moms bestowing upon their greedy tongues in days of yore gone by. Then the comedians, like Johnny Carson, started sarcastically to point out that we don’t appreciate tradition, ’cause now: Twinkies and Fudgey Whale cakes and crap like that.
I’m not saying you have to try it or like it, i’m saying–when’s the last time you made one or ate a slice of actual home-made, lovingly crafted fruit cake?
So–a few days on the f. sugarbomb.
Let’s start with the idea of the old lady and her tradition.
“Mrs. O’Leary’s Fruitcake” is brought to you by Ruby Murray, a jewel of the Emerald Isle from the 1950s. It’s detailed, improbable, and quite Irish–an old cabaret tale. Pat Harrington does this more deadpan, less lilting.
“Mrs. Hooligan’s Christmas Cake” becomes a crowd-pleasing folk happening for The Spinners. Not quite the same song–more threat of death by cake here. And more sibilant sound effects (spitting). The incomprehensibly accented version is from Clinton Ford. The Charles Peake music hall overly serious version claims provenance from Finnegan’s Wake.
Actually it’s a variant of the original “Miss Fogarty’s Christmas Cake,” which inspired James Joyce sommat. Willy Brady relates this without smirk. Tommy Mulvihill quicksteps this business like he wants to jig away the calories. Mick Moloney slows this down as if chewing his way through an entire slice. Steel Clover snarks it up making me wonder if this is what Irish sounds like with a Bronx accent. Stan Ransom swallows the lyrics in favor of featuring a fine mandolin backing. Seamus Kennedy returns us to standard basso monotone. Brass Farthing‘s is flat yet lively, Golden Bough‘s is tinny yet earnest, Danaher Cloud‘s is spastic, yet authentic, and The Poxy Boggards‘ is multimedia overdone. Altogether inedible, nae? Surely you will not listen to all these. So, settle for the brand you know: The Irish Rovers party through this high disrespect with brave militaristic merriment. They make Irish sound musical. And their instrumental outro is just madness.
Some songs take the Christmas cake half-baked. Then there’s perfectly moist, a balance of tart and sweet, with right angles.
Cheat day: some songs sing cake and mean something (fruitcake) else. But if they only say cake then they may stand tall here in this category. So it goes with Arrogant Worms heralding the immutability of “The Same Christmas Cake.” Piece on Earth!
Christmas cake = home for Dulanka Nayanajith. Not sure where his home is, but “Christmas Cake” rocks it lounge style. This should be boring middle-of-the-road ‘music,’ but it satisfies my cake urges. Thumbs in!
Sweet as sugar, Rachel Debattista croons “The Christmas Baking Tray” detailing the process of making, baking, waking the cake in all of us for Christmas. Nice ice baby.
Heavy in my rotation is Rilo Kiley’s “Xmas Cake.” This ballet of new age misery sweeps around the room like the spatula of heartbreak, icing and neatening the confection of concern just for you.
When it comes to Christmas, i say CAKE and you say something about produce that hangs off a tree.
Cake is fine any time, though.
And so is reggae. I know we just had a slice, but Jamaica Jam bakes up “Christmas Cake (In the Oven Baking)” as a dance party for the holidays and for the children and for the holiest of holies having a birthday. This beats out Adu Deme & Dave Azi just a dred with their more solemn “Christmas Cake.” (No cake in the song, mon.)
Punk pokery takes place under the auspices of The Yobs with “Who Had All the Christmas Cake?” BLUE ALERTThese boys are unhappy about the cake eaters who may or may not have come down the chimney. While we’re down and dirty, Swaggy G white-child-raps “Christmas Cake” in which this seasonal treat somehow represents his ass.
Hey, did that cake come from home–or did it come from Christmas? Red State Update has a brief reminder about how your eating habits affect your holiday bliss with their “Christmas Cake.” Miss you boys!
