Billy Idol - Yellin’ at the Christmas Tree.
OK, not exactly new, it’s about ten years old, but it’s fairly recent.
They played “Joel, Joel, the Lump of Coal” on Jimmy Fallon last night. That was pretty good.
It’s a conservative genre but not completely immune to new offerings.
Mary Did you Know was written about 20 years ago. Well after my childhood.
Probably the most successful of the new Christmas songs.
Gah! Are you trying to make me claw my eardrums out? Not only is that the easiest song ever to get stuck in one’s head, but it’s also the most obnoxiously annoying tune. If I’m going to have something stuck in my head, it should at least be something good.
Thanks bienville, I like those!
That song is one of the most annoying and badly written pieces of shit ever recorded in any genre.
In my humble opinion of course.
It was written by Paul at a point where he was
- playing around with a new synth he’d just bought, and
- stoned out of his gourd for several days in a row.
That explains a lot about that song.
Plenty of novelty songs around every year. Some not-very-recent ones include Proper Crimbo, Once Upon a Christmas Song, and The Way-Too-Early Christmas Song. All quality entries in their own unique way.
The non-novelty songs putter on as well. Being a maudlin sort, I remain a fan of the Eagles’ “Please Come Home For Christmas” which is bloody depressing but catchy.
Kelly Clarkson’s “Underneath The Tree” gets a decent amount of airplay.
I love that song. But my personal #1 favorite Christmas song is from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. It’s called “Christmas Eve Sarajevo,” and it’s from 1996. You’d probably recognize it if you heard it, even if you don’t know its name.
This time of year is my favorite christmas song the was written about 2003. It both rocks and is sentimental hopefully it will become a classic.
*Fairytale of New York *was released in 1987 and is bona fide. OK, yes, that is almost 30 years ago, but it is at least post Baby Boomer childhood.
My second favorite Christmas song ever, but…it’s a mashup of “God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen” and “Carol of the Bells,” not an original work.
A few years ago, i read an article in the Chicago Tribune about the phenomenon of “all holiday music” programming on local radio stations. The writer had interviewed the program director at the Chicago station which has traditionally been the market’s leader in the format (IIRC, they did it first, and switch to the format earliest in the year).
The program director indicated that their research showed that there was a very small list of holiday songs (only about 40 or so) which most of their listeners really wanted to hear, and that most of those recordings were 30 to 70 years old. He indicated that his challenge was playing those songs as frequently as he could, while still mixing in other songs (both old and new) in order to (a) see if newer songs might be able to crack that list, and (b) so that the list of “favorites” doesn’t get played to death.
If the 80s is considered new then that decade gave us both Bob Geldoff’s Band Aid Christmas song and the Waitresses’ Christmas Rapping which are staples on the “all Christmas music” radio channel.
There’s also Christmas in Hollis by Run-DMC
I’d believe it. Yesterday’s drive, I heard no fewer than 6 versions of “Carol of the Bells”. Which happens to be a favorite song of mine, but I was getting a little sick of it, and it’s only the first day I was tuned in!
The Christmas songs by the Kinks and the Waitresses came out right about that same time. A small spike of new additions to the canon.
There’s also Sandler’s Hanukkah Song, which I think dates to the mid-90s.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it. Actually, I just checked out some versions on YouTube and I’ve heard it but I wouldn’t say I hear it very often at all. Lots of covers, though so it does seem popular.
IMHO “All I Want For Christmas Is You” (1994) by Mariah Carey and “Last Christmas” (1985) by George Michael are the two biggest popular Christmas songs since “Wonderful Christmas.”