🎄 Holidays! All Christmas,all the time

[Rudy]

Mac: I was almost correct: "Merry Christmas Darling" came not four, but almost five hours later. Along with a half dozen others I'd heard just hours earlier. I also don't see the logic in playing Nat King Cole's "The Christmas Song", followed less than a half hour later by Al Jarreau's version. Maybe next year it will be "All 'Christmas Song', All The Time."

What bothers me personally is me being such a "Bah Humbug" toward something as innocent as Christmas music. But it just rubs me the wrong way, I guess, when I start thinking that these songs "tested well" against a group of listeners...and pretty soon we'll even be sick of Nat King Cole's "Christmas Song" since it's beyond being repeated...it's being HAMMERED. Just seems so...commercial. (I feel like Charlie Brown. )

 

[Tim Neely]

Don't have Cheap Channel in this market (thank goodness), but our "light FM" station began its "all-holiday all the time" programming a week earlier than usual this year (Dec. 13). Obviously, my radio is tuned to it most of the time.

I observe some of the same phenomena as the rest of you do. I think I've already heard Barry Manilow's version of "River" four times in four days. I've heard Stan Freberg's "Nuttin' for Christmas" AND "Green Chri$tma$" twice so far. I've heard that instrumental version of "What Child Is This" that uses the vamp from "Take Five" (or is that "Take Six"? they added an extra beat) twice; bizarrely, I've heard "Gonna Eat for Christmas" by Gloria Estefan & Rosie O'Donnell twice. This station loves Mannheim Steamroller (on average, one MS song every two hours), the Carpenters (lost count of how many; they even played "Carol of the Bells" in all its instrumental glory), and has added last year's Bob Rivers CD (so far, I've heard "Decorations" and "The Twisted Chipmunk Song"). It also has plenty of new music (Steve Tyrell, Jo Dee Messina, Barry Manilow, plus I heard a version of Jim Brickman's "Simple Things" with Christmas lyrics and I heard a couple Josh Groban tracks).

One of the highlights was hearing "My Favorite Things" by Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass. I've always enjoyed its "Taste of Honey"-like arrangement.

Once in a while, this station gets a bit more adventurous; two years ago, "Mary Had a Baby" by Bruce Cockburn was on several times, and a year before that, they dug up "Christmas in the Trenches" by John McCutcheon. Nothing yet in that vein, but I'll stay tuned.

 

[Mr Bill]

...and a year before that, they dug up "Christmas in the Trenches" by John McCutcheon. Nothing yet in that vein, but I'll stay tuned.

That is a wonderful tune. McCutcheon is much underappreciated beyond the folk niche. His Corvette song is a classic!

--Mr Bill

 

[Rudy]

It just occured to me yesterday that Ann Arbor also has a Cheap Channel AC station (WQKL, 107.1FM)...sure enough, they've also been playing Christmas music all the time. What I've noticed is that while I haven't had it on long enough to hear the repeats every four hours, they are playing a different batch of tunes. Nothing spectacular, but about five minutes ago they were playing (sit down for this one) the TJB's version of "Jingle Bell Rock"!!

Will wonders never cease? It's nice to live between two radio towns (and close enough to a third--Toledo, OH--as well as Ontario) and have a little variety. At least I can listen to a different four hours of repeats a little longer today.

 

[jimac51]

Before the Christmas forum is put in a box with the tinsel and lights,I wanted to give a final grade for the "All Christmas,all the time" format(give us 22 minutes,we'll trim your tree). Overall-a C-minus. Why? Well,first off,I'd give an A+Plus for the idea. Who would have thought that a radio station chain(not a network)would dump formats throughout the country and put Christmas music on for a four week period. What a gutsy idea! Suicidal-perhaps,especially with radio-a medium which has been formatted down our throats to expect the same thing,instantly and constantly(a major reason why restrictive formats of today are so bad-they don't take ANY chances and always shoot for the lowest common denominator). The problem,and the low mark,is for execution. No warning(print ads or teasers would have been helpful) and,once again,that restrictive format(especially from Neil's keen ear)pulls them down. I would love have the job to format this idea-a whole year to get ready for next year. A personal note about the "Hippo" song that seemed to show up on most stations after years of obscurity. My wife's adult son,Chris,is seeing a woman who has a four year-old girl in her life. That little girl already stole my heart over the summer(I'm kinda a young Grandpop for her)but when I saw her Christmas Eve,she leaped into my arms and wanted to see if I had a copy of the "hippo" song she was hearing on the radio these past weeks. Wow! She knew all the words, and loved it like I loved the "Chipmunk Song" years back in 1958 when I was just a little older than she is today. Who says that no one important is listening? That little girl will rememberthat song FOREVER and I have a year to find a copy for her(any help,Mr. Neely?). Thank heavens,she didn't ask for diamonds yet. Mac

 

[Rudy]

My older daughter (8) knows all of the words, and the younger just sort of hums along because she can't keep up yet.

The hippo song is on Dr Demento's Xmas CD on Rhino. I never was a Cheech & Chong fan (maybe I took the wrong drugs? ), but somehow, after hearing this song for the past several years, it doesn't seem like the holidays without it! That one's on the CD as well.

"...and a Japanese transistor radio."

Being a bit lazy at times, I'd turn on our Cheap Channel Christmas stations. I'd probably concur with the C- grade for the same reasons. I just found it amazing that when I used to have a Live365 internet radio station, I was able to get just over 25 hours of music online with no repeats. We have two CC stations within earshot--Detroit's WNIC, and Kool 107 out of Ann Arbor (which broadcasts from Domino's Farms, and is actually a bit closer to us than Detroit). They had different programming, but both stations seemed to be on that 4-5 hour repeat cycle. A few songs would vary, but you could count on others like clockwork.

My tastes are a lot broader than what they programmed for. Less of the newer recordings and more classics, with more variety in styles, would have fit the bill.

One I didn't pull out this year was the old RCA album The Swingin' Nutcracker, by Shorty Rogers & His Giants. This was Shorty at his finest, and I don't think the Nutcracker ever swung harder, except maybe when Les Brown and his Band of Renown did a different swingin' version of it (which the Brian Setzer Orchestra pays homage to in their version).

 

[Tim Neely]

Yes, Mac, that Gayla Peevey "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas" is on, I believe, both Dr. Demento Christmas CDs, both the one from the 1980s and the one from the late 1990s. I'm surprised it's not anthologized more often than it is. Several years ago there was a CD reissue of the Harmony Records vinyl classic First Christmas Record for Children, and bonus tracks were added -- I thought this would be a perfect addition to that album ... Gayla did several other Christmas singles, which are just ripe for rescuing from obscurity some day, such as "Got a Cold in the Node for Christmas."

I tend to agree with Mac ... a great idea, not as well executed as it could have been. It made you think there had been, oh, about 200-250 versions of Christmas songs ever recorded. You'll get that many in a good year! And some of the "new" songs they picked out were rather lame -- the overkill award goes to Barry Manilow's version of "River." One station I listened to actually pulled out Joni Mitchell's original version and played it a couple times. Hooray!

And I just saw that Josh Groban's version of "O Holy Night" actually hit #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart for the week of December 28, 2002; I think it's the first time ever that a pure Christmas song has hit the top of that chart. Alas, the only place that track appears right now is on his newest live CD, which also includes a DVD and is priced accordingly; I was hoping to see it on a compilation. Or maybe a promo CD single will magically appear somewhere

 

[Tim Neely]

"...and a Japanese transistor radio."

I've heard this on the radio several times in the past several years. For years, all I ever heard on this Allan Sherman song was my original 45, and I noticed something disconcerting about it when I finally heard it on the radio. Then I realized what it was. A word was snipped out of the song -- the word "naked," as in "Statue of a (naked) lady with a clock where her stomach ought to be." That alteration, I have since found out, was made decades ago -- in fact, when "The Twelve Gifts of Christmas" made its album debut on For Swingin' Livers Only!, the word "naked" was already gone! (At least on the stereo LP in my collection.) And it's evidently never been seen again, not even on the Dr. Demento collections. Makes me wonder if someone back in '64 snipped out the word "naked" from the master tape and threw it away.

 

[Rudy]

Isn't that phrase repeated a few times, or was "naked" only inserted the first time through? Not having heard the original, I never would have guessed!

 

[jimac51]

Thanks,Tim,for the Dr. D info. And to think I ordered,checked in,sold,reordered and returned that album for years. Just like I never bothered to get the TJB Chridtmas album on CD until after it was cutout. And Lani Hall's "Classics",which was so old that Polygram wouldn't let us return it because it was never in shrink wrap after the longbox was discarded.(Longbox-A truly '80s & '90s music business term that will never be used again I suspect. Just left to those ebay collectors who must own every part of an artist's merchandise.) But I digress.... Mac

 

[Tim Neely]

Isn't that phrase repeated a few times, or was "naked" only inserted the first time through? Not having heard the original, I never would have guessed!

It appears twice, and both times the word "naked" was in the original and snipped when it was issued on LP.

On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me..
Statue of a naked lady with a clock where her stomach ought to be ...

I think starting with day 6, he would say or sing "And all that other stuff" -- or skip it entirely -- and go right to "And a Japanese transistor radio."

Finally, on Day 12, "On the 12th day of Christmas, although it may seem strange (ooo, ooo) ... on the 12th day of Christmas, I'm going to exchange..." and then he listed all the presents including the statue.

 

[Rudy]

(Longbox-A truly '80s & '90s music business term that will never be used again I suspect. Just left to those ebay collectors who must own every part of an artist's merchandise.) But I digress.... Mac

Somewhere, I still have several dozen longboxes. I was going to make some kind of mural out of them, but hey, if they're worth something...

One "longbox" you may remember was the one for the Prince CD Around The World In A Day. There was quite an uproar over it. This was the first CD I bought that came in a cardboard "mini LP" sleeve. The "longbox" was actually an LP-sized cover or booklet that contained all the lyrics, and a slot to store the CD in. I still have that somewhere, packed away.