Recently in Holiday Horrors Category

Earlier this week, James Urbaniak tweeted a link to this Christmastime horror from the 1950s: gift-cartons of cigarettes from Camel!



I'm not anti-smoking per se; I think everyone should be allowed to go to hell with themselves in the manner of their choosing, so long as it doesn't abjectly affect those around them. Even so, to the modern eye this sort of ad reeks of strangeness.

Also, cigarettes were pretty cheap back then. So wouldn't giving cigarettes be like giving someone socks, or a box of pencils? "Wow, Camels. These are like 50 cents a pack. Thanks a lot."

Naturally, this ad piqued my curiosity. Were Christmas-themed cigarettes common back then, or was Camel the only cigarette company to go in such a direction? The answer is, no, they definitely were not the only company to suggest cigarettes for Christmas and create festive packaging for just this purpose (with a gift card built right in!). But Camel was one of the few to actually enlist The Big Man himself in their effort.


Here's a similar ad for Lucky Strike from around the same time, with some bonus print ads extolling the virtues of giving cigarettes as Christmas presents. Remember, Lucky Strike means fine tobacco! So round, so firm, so fully packed, as my grampa used to say (though not in reference to cigarettes...).



Celebrities got into the act, too. Here's an ad for Kent cigarettes featuring one-third of the cast of The Dick Van Dyke Show.

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The Chipmunks are one of those things I still don't quite get. Who let them happen? Even before the terrible movies of the 00s, and the not-very-good cartoon of the 80s (which I saw every single episode of five times), how did they start in the first place?

Fifty years ago, there were no songs where grown men sped up their voices. Then, Ross Bagdasarian realized that (a) he could do this, and (b) it sounded kinda funny to him and not at all like scraping styrofoam on a chalkboard.

Shouldn't the public have rebelled against this idea when it was first presented to them? "Hold on a second. Why do we want this? And why exactly is a 40-year-old man's voice all sped up supposed to sound like a chipmunk? And why are they singing about Christmas? And why is he always screaming at them? What's his problem?"

My theory is because Bagdasarian slowly acclimated people to this horror by releasing another "speedy voice" song, "The Witch Doctor". That song only used fast vocals in the chorus and became a number 1 hit, so it deadened the public's ears to the monstrosity he would unleash upon them during the holiday season.

Still, shouldn't someone have realized how hideous this was? Especially when the Chipmunks "appeared" on The Ed Sullivan Show to "sing" the song in the form of creepy puppets, as you can see here (speed ahead to about 2:30, unless you want to see some bad Alvin imitations of classic artists and/or The Fresh Prince).

Then again, I don't want my kids blaming me for terrible things that happened during my adulthood. I'm guessing the list would start with either the Iraq war or Crazy Frog. So let us pull triumph from horror and watch yet another Patton Oswalt "video", as he talks about the joys of playing this song on a record player v e r y   s l o w l y .

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Over the years, my opinion of Garrison Keillor has wavered between marked indifference and grudging respect. What he does is not really for me, but I appreciated that he was able to construct a cottage industry out of an art form (live radio variety) that doesn't really exist anymore. Good for him, I thought, as long as I don't have to hear him.

Then I saw an editorial he wrote for the Baltimore Sun last week, which was so anti-intellectual, racist, and jam packed full of faulty logic, I've shelved my indifference. He's a creep and definitely worth my active hate.

Let's check out the lowlights, shall we?

I've just come from Cambridge, that beehive of brilliance, where nerds don't feel self-conscious: There's always someone nerdier nearby. If you are the World's Leading Authority on the mating habits of the jabberwock beetle of the Lesser Jujube Archipelago, you can take comfort in knowing that the pinch-faced drone next to you at Starbucks may be the W.L.A. on 17th-century Huguenot hymnody or a niche of quantum physics that is understood by nobody but himself.

Kinda like the host of a weird radio show that features banjo and fiddle bands as if it's 1925.

People in Cambridge learn to be wary of brilliance, having seen geniuses in the throes of deep thought step into potholes and disappear. Such as the brilliant economist Lawrence Summers, whose presidency brought Harvard to the verge of disaster. He, against the advice of his lessers, invested Harvard's operating funds in the stock market and lost the bet. In the cold light of day, this was dumber than dirt, like putting the kids' lunch money on Valiant's Fancy to win in the 5th. And now the genius is in the White House, two short flights of stairs above the Oval Office. This does not make Cantabrigians feel better about our nation's economic future.

You can blame Ralph Waldo Emerson for the brazen foolishness of the elite. He preached here at the First Church of Cambridge, a Unitarian outfit (where I discovered that "Silent Night" has been cleverly rewritten to make it more about silence and night and not so much about God), and Emerson tossed off little bon mots that have been leading people astray ever since. "To be great is to be misunderstood," for example. This tiny gem of self-pity has given license to a million arrogant and unlovable people to imagine that their unpopularity somehow was proof of their greatness.

And all his hoo-ha about listening to the voice within and don't follow the path, make your own path and leave a trail and so forth, encouraged people who might've been excellent janitors to become bold and innovative economists who run a wealthy university into the ditch.

I don't know how you draw a line from Lawrence Summers to Ralph Waldo Emerson. I think Keillor might have gotten those two names from a Random Famous Person Generator. If the algorithms broke differently, he could've written a column about Sir Walter Raleigh and Lady Gaga.

Nice line about janitors, Garrison. I thought those were the kind of hard working, simple folk you celebrated in your unlistenable show. Good to know it's all an act and you secretly hate their dumb guts.

If you're beginning to detect an unsettling anti-intellectual theme emerging here, I assure we've only scratched the surface.

Unitarians listen to the Inner Voice and so they have no creed that they all stand up and recite in unison, and that's their perfect right, but it is wrong, wrong, wrong to rewrite "Silent Night." If you don't believe Jesus was God, OK, go write your own damn "Silent Night" and leave ours alone. This is spiritual piracy and cultural elitism, and we Christians have stood for it long enough. And all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year [emphasis mine], Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write "Grab your loafers, come along if you wanna, and we'll blow that shofar for Rosh Hashanah"? No, we didn't.

Great to know he's not just a fraud, but a racist. What a shame we allowed Christmas to be sullied with lyrics written by dirty Jews! Way to stand up to Irving Berlin and Oscar Hammerstein!

This may come as a shock to you, Mr. Keillor, but not everyone shopping at the mall at Christmastime is religious. Or celebrates Christmas. What would you like to hear instead of "Let it Snow" and "Rudolph", "Adeste Fidelis" blasted on a loop? People would kill themselves left and right in the shoe department.

As for getting angry at the way Unitarians sing "Silent Night", no one put a gun to your head and forced you to go to the Unitarian Church, you intolerant asshole. If you hate the Unitarians so much, don't go to their meetings. That'd be like me going to see "A Prairie Home Companion" and complaining about your dumb parodies and totally affected down-homery.

Also, why this searing hatred for Unitarians? Aside from the fact that they're one of the most tolerant, non-judgmental sects in existence, there's not that many of them in comparison to other membership in other churches.You have to go seriously out of your way to come in contact with Unitarians, let alone hate them. Thanks for doing the leg work!

Christmas is a Christian holiday - if you're not in the club, then buzz off. Celebrate Yule instead or dance around in druid robes for the solstice. Go light a big log, go wassailing and falalaing until you fall down, eat figgy pudding until you puke, but don't mess with the Messiah.

Nobody messed with the Messiah! If I've ready your piece correctly, the thing that got your panties in a knot was a slight rewriting of "Silent Night" which, last time I checked, is just a song. It's a religious song, but it's not part of The Bible or any church's liturgy. It's hysterical to call rewriting it "spiritual piracy", when it was rewritten by members of a certain denomination as a reflection of their brand of faith. I might call what you're doing spiritual bullying, demanding that all churches subscribe to your own vision of Christmas.

Keillor closes his column by saying he now spends every Christmas in Norway, not far from the Arctic Circle, so he can enjoy the near-24 hours of no sunlight (the kind of Christmas we can all relate to!). Which is weird, because he strikes me as the kind of person who doesn't like things that are darker than him.

Is there a possibility this is all satire? Many people think so, because Keillor is usually lambasted by the right, not the left. If so, it's the worst satire ever. There's absolutely no clue, no written equivalent of a wink to warn the reader that this is all a parody of the kind of person who would think such things. Sadly, it seems he really is the kind of person who would think such things. As you might imagine, this column has stirred up quite a bit of negative reaction already, but near as I can tell, he has yet to say it was all just a joke.

Garrison Keillor built his career extolling the simple, home-spun virtues of small town America. How folks who live in these places have down-to-earth common sense and wisdom that eludes the pointy-headed types who live in big cities. Even though he could not wait to flee small town America; he spent most of his professional life living in New York City and did his extolling in the pages of The New Yorker, the absolute definition of an elite, effete publication. Even now, he lives in St. Paul, Minnesota, which isn't exactly Manhattan but isn't exactly Podunk, either.

And most of his audience remains NPR listeners from big cities and tony, elite suburbs, either nostalgic for the small-town life they also couldn't wait to flee, or imagining such an existence is spiritually superior to their own evil life in the city. Of course, none of these people (Keillor included) would actually relocate to a small town, because that would mean being too far away from good bagels and great movie theatres and awesome restaurants and all those other things that big, bad cities have in abundance.

Keillor owns a cute, small bookstore in St. Paul. If Lake Woebegone really existed, do you think it could support such a place? Hell no. All the Woebegonians would drive 20 minutes to the local mall and go to Borders, where they could get Dan Brown and Stephen King at much cheaper prices.

Like cities, small towns have pluses and minuses. One of their minuses is that people who live there often have narrow views of the universe. They mistake diversity for confusion and get annoyed by the fact that people can do the same thing in different ways. Or they get hung up on the mere existence of people who are different from them.

Not everyone from a small town is small minded, of course. And not everyone from the city is open minded. As Keillor proves, you can grow up in a small town, leave for the city as soon as possible, write for an elite magazine, and still maintain idiotic, stone age prejudices.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

As I wrote about "Do They Know It's Christmas", The Star Wars Holiday Special has been mocked so often it's almost cliche. But unlike the Band Aid song, The Star Wars Holiday Special has never helped anyone. And it has hurt everyone who has watched it. It may, in fact, be one of the worst things ever done on television (or to television, if you prefer).

George Lucas once said he wished he could destroy all existing copies of the special with a sledgehammer. Considering this is the guy who thought The Phantom Menace was great, you know the special has to be really, really bad.

In case you're not familiar with the story behind The Star Wars Holiday Special (and if you're not, please hand in your Nerd Card immediately), here's how it went down. In 1978, Lucas was already hard at work on The Empire Strikes Back, but was pressured by 20th Century Fox to have something Star Wars-related for the Christmas season that year.

As they say, failure is an orphan, so no one claims any responsibility for what followed. Lucas allowed a holiday special to be made, but has repeatedly stated he had virtually nothing to do with making it. He basically okayed or vetoed sketch ideas, most of them devised by a crew of 70s variety show scribes (including the omnipresent Bruce Vilanch). Predictably, this led to a bunch of very bad, very 1970s variety elements. If you took out all the Star Wars characters and replaced them with Paul Lynde and Donnie and Marie, you would not notice any difference.

Lucas's biggest involvement came with a 10-minute cartoon segment, which marked the first ever appearance of Boba Fett, thus explaining why this special still inspires huge Nerd Boners. But even if Lucas washed his hands of the thing, all of the main Star Wars characters appeared in the special, played by the original actors. They were not spared the stain of this special, which soiled everyone it touched.

The premise of the special: Han Solo tries to avoid imperial ships so he can get Chewbacca back to his home planet in time for Life Day. We see Chewbacca's family for the first time (and never again), including his son, Lumpy (!) and his father, Itchy (!). The writers must have thought everyone would be fluent in Wookie by Christmastime, because 75 percent of the show consists of Chewbacca's relatives barking at each other, with no subtitles.

And this is possibly the least insane aspect of the special. It features Art Carney as a trader, who protects Chewie's family while also delivering a weirdly erotic hologram to Itchy. Harvey Korman appears briefly for no good reason, as does Jefferson Starship (!). And Bea Arthur plays the owner of the infamous cantina, who sings a song about ejecting rowdy patrons from the premises.

If you can stand it, some sadist has posted the entire thing to the web here. I defy anyone to watch the entire thing in one sitting, or not feel like you've shaved years off your lifespan every time you view it. Though it's become a pop culture whipping boy, it is thoroughly deserving of that mantle.

It is so awful that it out-sucks another Star Wars Christmas cash-in: Christmas in the Stars, a 1980 holiday album with tunes such as "What Do You Get a Wookie for Christmas (When He Already Has a Comb?)". Just in case you thought George Lucas raping his own franchise began with the prequels, just know that he was perfectly willing to sell out Star Wars when he had only one movie under his belt.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

When you think of sports teams recording songs, you no doubt think of the Golden Era of Athletic Musicianship: The 1980s. "The Superbowl Shuffle". "Let's Go Mets". That Jamaican bobsled song. True classics that have stood the test of time.

But there were several earlier instances of a team lending their golden pipes to musical projects. In 1969, all 28 NFL teams recorded a collection of holiday favorites. If the cover of this version is any indication, the project was initiated by the players' union, not the NFL itself. You'll also notice that Santa loves good ol' smash mouth football, as he tries to gouge out a running back's eyes.

I have only heard one song from one of these collections: "Jingle Bells", as sung by the New York Giants on The Giants Sing Holiday Halftime. In the early 70s, Jean Shepherd often used this song as bed music while be told a Christmas tale, and sometimes just played it straight up.

I will give the Giants this: They certainly sounded like they were into it. Though the spirit might have been willing, the throats were weak. Very weak. Especially since the arranger decided to modulate the song to higher and higher keys as it went along, a decision that stretched the Giants' already limited singing skills past their breaking points. I would say they should've stuck to their day jobs, but they weren't that great at that, either; the Giants went 6-8 in 1969.

You can hear the original tune at the Jean Shepherd fan site FlickLives.com by clicking here. They also have a clip of Shep explaining why he enjoyed playing it so much, which you can listen to here (although he misidentifies the offending team as the Jets).

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As I mentioned in a previous post, the American version of the Santa story has been sanitized a little bit. Most of the legends/backstory we think about when we think about Santa come from Germanic folktales. And like most things with Germanic origins, the earlier incarnations are pretty terrifying. Think the fairytales of The Brothers Grimm, or David Hasselhoff.

The Santa Claus of old folklore is similar to the one we know. He puts presents and treats in the stockings of good kids. But he is also trailed by a trickster demon who punishes the wicked kids. In most tellings, this twisted creature's name is KRAMPUS.

What does KRAMPUS look like? A lot like that handsome devil to your right. He's a goat-like monster, with cloven hooves, curly horns, and a terrifyingly long tongue. He carries around a switch, which he uses to beat naughty children. Sometimes, he's depicted wielding a chain instead (yikes). He also carries a basket, in which he deposits especially bad children, in order to carry them back to Hell (double yikes).

In the 19th century, Krampus was so popular that holiday greeting cards featuring him were sent all over Europe. Most of them had the ironic/ominous message Gruss vom Krampus ("Greetings from Krampus").

Some of these cards showed Krampus as mischievous, like this one, which has him stealing oranges from little kids. Some showed him as being extremely violent. Some depicted him as a bawdy, satyr-like figure, as the lower-left card in this collage did. Some were just plain bizarre, like this one that shows Krampus all decked in leather, driving a motorcycle, while a passive St. Nicholas rides in the sidecar.

Lest you think this is a relic of simpler times, know that in parts of Europe, people still dress up as Krampus every December 5. They create elaborate demon-masks and roam the streets with chains and other noisy things. Their goals are two-fold: 1) to scare people; 2) to get shit faced. It's sort of a holiday mashup of Halloween and St. Patrick's Day. (The Morning News has an interesting description of Krampustage from an American's perspective, which you can read here.)

For some reason, Krampus got airbrushed out of American Christmas traditions. My guess is because he's terrifying. You won't find too many references to the child tormentor in our Yuletide fare, although he was referenced on a recent Colbert Report, and seen in the Christmas mini-episode of The Venture Brothers.

So if you dread heading to your folks' house and drinking too much egg nog, just know that it could be worse. You could have been brought up to know that on Christmas Eve, you might get presents, or you might get dragged to Hades by a fiendish goat-man.

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I once again stand by my contention that the original Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is "an unbridled triumph". The same can not be said for the cheapy CGI sequel I shall not mention by (confusing) name again. But that wasn't the first piece of Rudolphiana that failed to make the grade. Sadly, even some of the official Rankin-Bass follow-ups were not up to the bar set by their masterwork.

Witness Rudolph's Shiny New Year, an odd duck of a holiday special produced by Rankin-Bass in 1976. Worst holiday special ever? No, not even close. It has much of the charm and spirit that made the original Rudolph so great. I hesitate to say it's even bad. But it is weird. Really, really weird.

It starts out simple enough. Rudolph, just back from his triumphant sleigh ride around the world, is asked by Father Time (voiced by Red Skelton) to locate Baby New Year, who ran away after constant taunting about his big ears.* Unless Baby New Year can be found in time, it will remain December 31 forever!

* The guys at Rankin-Bass really had a thing for protagonists who were teased to the breaking point. I'm betting there were a lot of club foots and lazy eyes in their development department.

Anywhoozle, if you're already on board for talking, flying reindeer and Baby New Year, this is all pretty straightforward. Unfortunately, the special takes a sharp left turn in to Crazy Town shortly thereafter.

Rudolph embarks on his quest, not accompanied by Hermey, but by General Ticker, a clock shaped military man who only speaks in rhyme. He searches for Baby New Year in The Archipelago of Last Years, which is where each year gets its own island once it's ended. He winds up on a caveman island, a colonial America island, and a medieval island which, inexplicably, is filled with storybook characters. At some point, Rudolph is joined by a Ben Franklin lookalike (who's called Sev, for some reason) and Big Ben, a whale with a huge clock in his tail.

Oh, and Rudolph is being pursued by a giant buzzard named Aeon who wants to capture Baby New Year so he won't die when the year ends, because of some sort of not-well-explained time/space technicality. How's that make you feel about the holidays, kids?

If my descriptions seem vague and not fleshed out, it's because the same can be said of this special. It's like Rankin-Bass took a million different ideas, put them in a blender, poured this goop out onto a piece of paper, and called it a script. I've seen Rudolph's Shiny New Year several times, and I still don't quite understand what it's about. Or who it's meant for. Or where I am, really, as I'm watching it.

Although I do applaud Rankin-Bass for their aggressive darkness. You might expect to a special called Rudolph's Shiny New Year to be more festive and cheerful. Instead, you get a stop-motion version of Fellini's Satyricon. 

If you really want to delve deep into its nuances, Progressive Boink did an almost scene-for-scene deconstruction of its weirdness a few years back, which you can peep here. But be warned: THERE ARE SOME THINGS YOU CAN'T UNSEE, MAN!

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UPDATE, 12.16.09: Video now working. Thanks for your patience.

I've written about this before, but I think it bears repeating: I was scarred for life by the news teasers I saw as a kid. There are two reasons for this.

1) I grew up in New York in the 1980s. In these post-Giuliani's reich years, it's hard to remember just how truly effed up NYC was in the 80s. The city was beset by all manner of horrifying things--drugs, murder, arson, poverty, Ed Koch...

2) The 1980s also marked the beginning of SCARE NEWS. Local stations couldn't just entice you with actual news. They did SPECIAL REPORTS and INVESTIGATIONS on how everything in your house could murder you in your sleep.

The combination of these two phenomena made watching TV as a kid an exercise in terror. In my memories, the news was even worse during the holidays. Every news clip took place in a driving snowstorm, with squad car lights glinting off dirty road ice, and included at least three of the following:

• A crumbling tenement stairwell
• Cops draping a white sheet across a dead body
• Blood spattered on wall/floor/window
  
• A front door blackened by fire/explosion
• Close up of a crack vial
• Victim's screaming relatives
• Charred children's toys
  
• A sketch of the alleged perpetrator, making him look like maniac

If you weren't there, it's hard to convey just how frightening it was. But thanks to the Vast and Dusty Scratchbomb VHS Archives, I've compiled a bunch of these teasers into one handy-dandy YouTube clip.

Most of these are from CBS-2, but they're pretty representative of news teasers for all local NYC stations back in the 1980s. Keep in mind, all of these teasers--all of them--aired during holiday specials intended for kids. "Manhunt in progress for the man police call The Face-Peeling Rapist. Is he in your town? We'll tell you at 11. But now, back to A Charlie Brown Christmas!"

It appears today's scheduled Holiday Horrors post is experiencing technical difficulties. In the meantime, please enjoy this pinch-hitting horror. For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

I hate to pick on Neil Diamond, but...Actually, scratch that. I don't hate to pick on Neil Diamond at all. He's kinda ridiculous, in a way not totally unlike another of my favorite giggle targets, Danzig. He has that perfect blend of theatricality and self-importance that I really admire in a figure of mockery.

Having mentioned Neil's rendition of "The Little Drummer Boy" (and his Christmas special) in a previous post, I figured that was enough Diamond bashing for one holiday season. But then my cousin hipped me to another one of his Christmas tunes. I am so glad he did, because this is a goldmine (if goldmines contained rich veins of turd instead of gold).

It's called "Cherry Cherry Christmas". Perhaps you've heard Neil's smash 1970s hit "Cherry Cherry". When I first heard Neil Diamond wrote a song called "Cherry Cherry Christmas", I thought it might just be a repurposed version of the earlier tune. You know, with the lyrics altered slightly. "She's got the way to Yule me!"

But it's not. And amazing as this might sound, you'll wish it was once you hear "Cherry Cherry Christmas."



I didn't even know what to say the first time I listened to it, because I didn't really know what I just heard. Did Neil Diamond just take the title of one of his biggest hits and slap it on a holiday song? One that doesn't sound anything like the original?! One that namechecks other songs of his? And not just a few times, but constantly throughout the song?!

Seriously, can you imagine anyone else doing something like this? Of course you can't. Only Neil Diamond has the sheer balls and lack of shame to pen and perform a song in which he wishes everyone a Neil Diamond Christmas.

To really appreciate its grandeur, you need to break it down piece by piece.

Start: Swelling music, jingle bells, flutes, glockenspiel...oh, this is going to be a soft, sentimental Christmas song. That sounds nice...

0:13: Wish you a very merry, Cherry Cherry Christmas/And a Holly Holy holiday too...That is the first line of this song. These are the first words you hear in this song. Look, this tender holiday-themed music isn't to get you into the Christmas spirit. It's to get you to check out the remastered Neil Diamond back catalog, currently on sale at Amazon, iTunes, and Best Buy.

If Neil had done this as a rollicking, tongue-in-cheek holiday song, it might have worked. Might have. But The Jazz Singer would have none of that. No, his song about how everyone should have a Neil Diamond Christmas is very serious and can only be appropriately expressed through the use of harp and a 40-piece string section.

0:45: After a bunch of oppressively dumb lyrics (and another shoutout to one of his own compositions, "Song Sung Blue"), Neil ends the first verse with these words: You'll have a very merry, Cherry Cherry, Holly Holy, rock n' roll-y Christmas this year. Just a reminder: Neil Diamond was born in 1958. He is not 6 years old, as these lyrics might indicate.

1:11: Feels like pretty amazing grace/If you know what I mean...No, Neil, I haven't the slightest idea what you mean. Unless you're referring to the song "Pretty Amazing Grace" off of your 27th studio album, Home Before Dark, which I'm sure can be picked up at Borders and all fine retailers at a reasonable price.

1:29: In a world of make believe, I'm a believer/And I believe in things not always understood...Did you know that Neil Diamond has a wonderful plan for your life? He's so magical, he can even reference songs he wrote for others but never recorded himself!

2:03: Let's raise a Christmas toast of red red wine/We'll even sing "Sweet Caroline"/While the whole world sings along...It take a special kind of man to not only reference two of his own songs in one verse, but insist the entire world will be chanting one of them in his honor to celebrate Jesus' birth. Is that because Jesus' mother's name was Caroline, or because he's a Sox fan?

2:13: Cue the sax solo from "Just the Way You Are"!

2:44: Makes you wanna have a very merry/Holly Holy/Cherry Cherry/Christmastime the whole year long...Sorry Neil, I think in such a world, the survivors would envy the dead.

3:20: He ends by yelling out CHERRY CHRISTMAS, EVERYONE! Because if you're gonna write a Christmas monument to yourself, the time for restraint has long since passed. You go out with a bang, not a whimper. VERY CHERRY NEIL DIAMOND-MAS IN BLUE JEANS, EVERYONE! AND A HOT AUGUST NIGHT TO YOU AS WELL!

Congrats, Neil Diamond. You've written the most self-serving piece of Christmas dreck ever. You may collect your prize from the bursar.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

The Baby just turned three, and she's really into Christmas this year. She loves seeing the lights on people's houses and decorated trees. Every now and then, she'll just say "It's Christmas time!" because she's so excited about it. It's adorable.

Except for the whole Santa thing.

I'm not sure who's to blame, but I'm guessing it's her day care. Because all of a sudden, she says things like "Santa's coming!" and seems to actually "believe" in Santa, in the Traditional Holiday Special sense. Up to this point, The Wife and I strenuously avoided any mention of Santa as much as possible because we both think it's dumb, outmoded, and just wrong.

Yes, there is something precious and heartwarming about a tiny tot professing his/her belief in Santa. The problem is, it's a belief in something that's total bullshit. Would it be just as cute if I convinced The Baby to believe in a 10-foot-tall head of lettuce with arms and teeth that shat presents out of his butt-hole? Because that's about as true as the whole Santa deal.

Santa Claus dates back to a time when the average schmoe actually believed in ghosts, witches, and other mysterious, malevolent things. The world was a harsher place. Go look up the original, Germanic Santa Claus stories--they are truly horrifying. Because Santa never came alone. He was always trailed by trickster demons who plagued the naughty kids. And in those days, virtually everyone was naughty.

You wanted your kids to behave? You told them they'd get presents if they were good, beatings from a goat-legged goblin if they were bad. Just like the local priest told them they'd go to heaven if they shut up and plowed the field for their feudal lord, and go to hell if they didn't.

Santa Claus isn't make-believe, like when a little kid plays dress up or pretends s/he's an airplane. It's a lie. I don't like lying to my child. I understand the temptation to do so, like when The Baby wants more junk food and my first inclination is to say We don't have anymore. But that doesn't teach her anything. What does teach her something is saying, You can't have anymore because you've had a lot already and we're eating dinner very soon.

Lies are easy, the truth is hard. But what's even harder is one day, I have to tell my kid there's no Santa, just because everyone else thought it would be cute to see a little kid believe in medieval nonsense. Thanks, World.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

Last week, I referred to the original Rankin-Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer as "an unbridled triumph". I stand by that assessment, but my friend Shaun reminded me of one unpleasant factor in that otherwise spotless holiday classic: in it, Santa's a huge jerk.

Exhibit A: Santa visits Donner and wife once Rudolph is born. He sees Rudolph's shiny nose. A nervous Donner assures Santa that this is just a temporary thing. Santa's response: "I certainly hope so!" Rudolph's about three minutes old at this point, you insensitive clod!

Exhibit B: Rudolph's shiny nose is revealed at Reindeer Practice. The other reindeer freak out and make fun of him. Pretty uncool, but hey, they're just dumb reindeer. But Santa tells Donner he should "be ashamed of himself". Ashamed of himself! "How dare you sire such a monster!"

Exhibit C: Santa's intolerant hiring practices. The head elf in his workshop has a severe anti-dental bias, as evidenced by his irrational prejudice against Hermey, the tooth-loving elf.

Exhibit D: When the elves sing their song for Santa, The Big Man waves his hand, Mike Francesa style, and simply says, "It needs work, I have to go." The he storms out, leaving Mrs. Clause to apologize and do damage control.

Exhibit E: When intolerance drives both Rudolph and Hermey to run away from the North Pole, who goes after them? Not Santa. Clarice and Rudolph's mom attempt to find them, and almost get eaten by a Bumble in the process.

Exhibit F: After all of this, Santa impresses Rudolph into service as part of his reindeer gang, because suddenly the shiny-nosed freak proves useful. Most folks would've told Santa to go fuck himself, but Rudolph puts aside his ego so toys can be delivered.

In summation, Santa Claus in Rudolph: huge dick. Your honor, the defense rests.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

I bought something on eBay for The Wife for Christmas. Something expensive, something I couldn't just go get at a store. I bought this thing very early, knowing that shipping would take a while. I instructed the shipper to send said item to my place of business, because I knew I wouldn't be home during usual UPS delivery hours, and because I didn't want The Wife to discover a Mysterious Package on our doorstep.

All of this would've proceeded without a hitch, if the package had been shipped via anyone but UPS, who are apparently criminals. Or morons. Or criminally moronic.

The package was supposed to arrive at my office yesterday. When the day wore on and nothing had arrived yet, I tracked the package. It was listed as having an Exception. And the Exception was, RECIPIENT HAS MOVED.

That came as news to me, since I've had my current job for a while, and our office has not moved one foot in that entire time. So I called up the UPS people, and they told me the UPS delivery guy must have gotten confused because the delivery address didn't have my company's name. Even though I get shipments all the time sans company name.

Apparently, my company is served by the most literal UPS delivery guy on the planet. It's very nice that UPS is giving jobs to autistic people, but maybe they shouldn't be delivering packages.

UPS customer service told me I had two choices: get in touch with the shipper and tell him to add the company's name to the delivery address, or pick it up myself at a local facility. Said facility is literally blocks from my house, so I chose the latter. A minor inconvenience, but problem solved. Or so I thought.

When I got home, just to make sure the package was back in the facility, I tracked it again. This time, it had another exception, saying the delivery guy had tried again, I still had "moved", and the package was on its way back to the shipper. In California. (In case you don't know, I live about as far away as you can get from CA without entering another dimension.)

So I called up UPS again to try and figure out what happened. Between the online tracking and the phone reps I'm getting a lot of conflicting info, I said, so just assure me that I can pick this thing up at my local facility, I said.

Yes you can, said the UPS rep.

That's the UPS facility in Queens, right?

Frighteningly long pause. Um, no, the facility in San Jose.

Why is it going to a facility in San Jose? Unless there's a San Jose in Long Island.

Will you hold, please? Cue the awful hold music.

Five minutes, the UPS rep is back on the line, telling me that the package is schedule to pull a Biggie (aka go back to Cali). But he will attempt to contact the local facility and get them to intercept that before it happens.

An hour later, I got a call back from said local facility, which informed me the package was already "in processing" to go back to the shipper, and there was nothing they could do about it. Maybe you can order a new one and get the shipper to refund your money?

No, I can not do that, I said.

So this package took a week to get to me, but the second they couldn't drop it off--at the place where I work, where the receptionist knows who I am--UPS gets rid of it like it's covered in mad cow disease. And I had to tell The Wife, Hey, I ordered you something awesome for Christmas! But it may not get here until Memorial Day.

Just wanted to let everyone know, if you have any choice, please consider NOT using UPS. I mean, provided you're ordering something of value that you'd actually like to receive at some point. And don't want to RUIN YOUR CHRISTMAS.

But if you want a lot of inexplicable fuck-ups and unhelpful advice, they're the place to go.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

Perhaps the title of this post made you do a double-take. Surely he's not referring to the beloved holiday special?! No, of course not. The original Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is an unbridled triumph. (Although a friend of mine just reminded me of something disturbing in it, which I may cover in a future Holiday Horrors installment.)

What I'm referring to is a special produced for the direct-to-video market (a true mark of quality) in 2001. I don't think the title is meant to remind people of the Christmas classic--I think it's supposed to confuse them and make them think they're purchasing the original.

At least that was my initial reaction. ABC Family ran it earlier this week as part of their 25 Days of Christmas spectacular, and when I saw it listed in the cable guide, for a second I assumed it was the special I grew up with. So I turned it on, hoping to introduce The Baby to its charms. Needless to say, I was not pleased.

Though it contains many of the same characters--Hermey the Elf, Yukon Cornelius, many of the Island of Misfit Toy residents--any resemblance between it and 1964's Rudolph is purely coincidental. For one thing, it eschews the stop-motion craft of the original--you know, its major defining characteristic--for CGI. Bad CGI. Really, really bad CGI.



I know that technology proceeds at a breakneck pace nowadays. Eight years is a long time in Computer Years. Even so, this animation is unacceptable. Especially since the original was created with such care and attention to detail. Rankin-Bass made their original with stop-motion dolls, painstakingly shooting each scene frame by frame. You can see the craft in every shot.

In the 2001 retread, you can't see anything except all the corners that were cut. I'm definitely not anti-CGI. Every time I watch a Pixar film, I'm blown away at how computers can create something so warm and full of life. Then I see garbage like this and I remember, "Oh yeah, computers can make horseshit, too."

Remember how the original Rudolph had all of those catchy, heart-warming songs? This special doesn't have those either. Oh, it has songs. It just doesn't have memorable ones. The songs aren't horrible, but they sound as forced as a Katie Holmes smile looks. I actually felt sorry for the composer, trying to squeeze blood from this stone, and hoped that at least s/he was well compensated. But if the animation is any indication, no one involved with this thing was paid too well.

What happens in this special? Some guy steals toys, and then they go to the...island...or something. The writers clearly didn't care about a plot, so why should I? And for some reason, Rudolph still longs to have a normal nose, even though his red nose is the only reason anyone likes him. But that gets resolved when...ugh, it doesn't matter. I'm getting mad just thinking about it. And sleepy. Is there such an emotion as sleepy-mad?

But at least this special has star power! Burl Ives' banjo-playing snowman character is replaced by a reporter snowman called Scoop, played by Richard Dreyfuss. Rick Moranis and Jamie Lee Curtis each play villains. None of them distinguish themselves in any way, as if they hoped no one would notice their presence if they didn't get too excited. Like everything else about this special, their performances are resolutely mediocre.

This is easily one of the worst Christmas specials I've ever seen. There are worse specials in terms of overall quality, but this one tried to piggyback on Rudolph, a true work of art that's treasured by millions of people. It was obviously written by committee, rushed through production, and not given one iota of care and attention. Because whoever created it thought they could just appropriate the Rudolph characters, slap a confusing name on the DVD package, and rake in the dough.

Shame on you, sir or madam. May you get eaten by a Bumble.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

The time to make fun of New Kids on the Block, like the time of New Kids on the Block themselves, has long since passed. Such hackery belongs with jokes whose punchlines end in "Where's the Beef?"

However, no discussion of Holiday Horrors would be complete without a mention of their 1989 album Merry Merry Christmas. Slapped together in a cynical attempt to capitalize on both the group's popularity and the Yuletide season, it is a cornucopia of fake holiday sentiment, misappropriated hip-hop, and bad drum machines.

Late 80s music production drives me completely up the wall, and Merry Merry Christmas is no exception. This was the dawning of the digital recording era--also known as The Era of No Low End. Every sound is compressed to within an inch of its life, and it's all so trebly it makes Alvin and the Chipmunks sound like Barry White.

The album contains no redeeming features, but if I had to pick the worst track, I'd opt for "Funky, Funky, Xmas". There is so much to hate about it. From the cookie cutter beat to the sub-kindergarten-level lyrics to the unnecessary second comma in the title, it is wall to wall suck. And despite the double "funky"s in the title, it is about as funky as Perry Como. Especially as performed on The Arsenio Hall Show, which you can view below, if you dare.

This version is actually worse than the studio cut, because the Kids valiantly attempt to sing live over the screams of their adoring fans as they bust some Roger Rabbits. Unfortunately, without the benefit of the latest digital compressors, they sound like guys trying to shout at you across a room as they run on treadmills.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

I hate to divide people into camps, but I think I can safely say there are two kinds of people in America right now: People who hang on Glenn Beck's every word, and people who think he's batshit insane. There is no in between. There is no one who sorta likes him or catches his show every now and then. You either despise him or want a lock of his brush cut.

As vile as other right wing yakkers might be (Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly), they're not stupid. They know how to push people's buttons, but they also know what they can and can't say. When push comes to shove, they're just out to make a buck. If they could figure out how to make one more dollar as lefty talking heads than they do right now, they'd switch sides tomorrow.

Glenn Beck, on the other hand, is genuinely unhinged. And monstrously theatrical. He's like Joe McCarthy crossed with Bob Fosse. I would not be surprised if he did a whole show in a black union suit and bowler hat while flashing jazz hands.

The more I see Glenn Beck, the more I'm convinced that he will totally implode one day, and soon. It's a question of when, not if. And this won't be some simple indiscretion coming to light or a mild tantrum. This is gonna be the full Howard Beale. He is gonna snap, live on the air, and say/do something so insane that not even Fox News can excuse it.

How do I know? The Christmas Sweater.

If you're an effete liberal snob like me, you may not be familiar with The Christmas Sweater. That's Beck's heartstring-tugging multimedia spectacular. It tells the story of an ungrateful poor kid and his "return to redemption" (a phrase that gets exponentially stupider the more you think about it, like "a history of tradition").

It features Glenn Beck gesturing and fetal-positioning his way to forgiveness, a one-woman gospel Greek chorus, plot contrivances that would be rejected from the worst romance novel, and crying. Lots of crying. Good lord, this man knows how to turn on the waterworks. Do not trust anyone who can cry on cue like that. They're either manipulative, emotionally unstable, or doing pounds of blow.

Glenn Beck performed The Christmas Sweater last year, and it was simulcast in movie theatres across the country. Now it's back again, plaguing a multiplex somewhere you. For a blow-by-blow account of this monstrosity, peep Dave Holmes' blog post about going to see it with a friend for ironic purposes, and discovering to his horror that "the open mockery section...held exactly two people."

Seriously, read that post and tell me: You think this guy's here to stay? He's a sniper in search of a belltower.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

This falls under the category of "stuff that makes me sad for no good reason", as mentioned in my last Holiday Horrors post. Note that "Songs" in the title is plural. I assume many people can't name a Hannukah song other than "Dreidel Dreidel Dreidel", and I'm not sure that even qualifies under the legal definition of a song. It's more like a jingle.

No, there really aren't any Hannukah songs, just like there really aren't any Easter songs or Thanksgiving songs. It's not a holiday that's inspired too many composers to bang out a tune. But, if you were ever in the school band or chorus as a kid (or a parent of one), you know that Hannukah songs exist.

Because school music departments buy their sheet music (which is really expensive) in packages, usually themed. And the holiday packages inevitably include some "Hannukah song" for the purposes of inclusion. You will never have heard of this song, even if you're Jewish, because this song/composition was probably written by some guy at The Sheet Music Company to pad out the aforementioned package. (There weren't any Kwanzaa tunes when I was a kid, but I wouldn't be surprised if they exist now.)

So the school band conductor/chorus leader, not wanting anyone to feel left out (or let very expensive sheet music go to waste), has his young charges perform the song at the holiday concert. Even though, again, no one in attendance has ever heard of it. The song inevitably sounds like a number cut from Fiddler on the Roof in early rehearsals, and has a vague title like "Festival of Lights". And to emphasize it's tossed-off-edness, it is wedged into the program right before the showstopping Christmas medley.

When I was a kid, this always made me feel uncomfortable and embarrassed for any Jewish kids/families at my school, even though I couldn't quite put my finger on why. I guess because it's a strange, ham-fisted approach to cultural sensitivity. As if doing anything will be enough, even if it has little to no relevance to the culture involved--or is borderline insulting. "Hey, to honor your Italian heritage, I made a bowl of pasta and threw a Frank Sinatra album on top of it, and set it out on the dining room table as a decorative centerpiece. No need to thank me!"

Around this time every year, I always think of those weird, anonymous Hannukah tunes that everyone was forced to play and nobody liked. And I wonder if kids and parents still sit in stuffy school auditoriums, squirming with discomfort just hearing them.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

Weird things make me sad. Like signs that say GOING OUT OF BUSINESS, or old broken toys heaped on the curb for garbage pickup. I have no true connection to whatever situation has transpired, and yet the sight of these things gives me a deep, untouchable melancholy feeling.

In this category, I put drug store gift sets. If you've been to a CVS or Duane Reade around the holidays, you know of what I speak. They're usually toiletry related, like a set of brushes or a manicure set or five identically smelling but differently colored bath scents. They come in red and green boxes, and they usually have a preprinted price tag as part of the cardboard packaging, held on by a perforated hinge, so you can rip it off and no one will know how cheap you are.

I can not fully express how sad the sight of these gift sets makes me. No one wants to get them. No one wants to give them. If you're buying them, you're either buying them for someone you barely care about, or because you're too broke to get something better. And regardless of the reason, no one who receives them is happy.

Wow. I am so bummed out now I have to go lie down. Thanks, Walgreens.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

Most holiday tunes fall into one of two categories. There are religious Christmas songs, which celebrate the birth of Jesus (which totally couldn't have happened on December 25th and is just a remnant of an ancient pagan Roman bacchanal, but that's a whole other story). And there are secular Christmas songs, which celebrate snow and presents and togetherness.

And then there's "The Little Drummer Boy", which tries to be a mutant hybrid of both. It's definitely not secular, because it tells the story of a young percussionist who celebrates the Messiah's birth with some killer skin work. But this story can't be found in any Gospel account. So it's actually less a Biblical tale and more like Jesus Fanfic.

I believe people like this song for its pseudo-crypto-spirituality. It has religious elements to it, but it doesn't make people nervous by getting too serious. The Angel Craze of the last 15-20 years or so comes from a similar place. It has traces of Christianity, but not enough to, you know, help others or be more forgiving or change you life in any meaningful way. 

In other words, "The Little Drummer Boy" is a huge cop out. I'm not religious, but I will take traditional, overtly religious Christmas carols like "Silent Night" over this hunk of garbage. At least religious songs come from a sincere, genuine place. There's something manipulative about "The Little Drummer Boy", as if its composer yanked in the Jesus angle to make it criticism-proof. "Oh, you don't like my song, huh? Guess you don't like OUR LORD AND SAVIOR."

Also, what kind of gift is playing the drums for a newborn child, or his parents? If someone wanted to celebrate the birth of my child with a Gene Krupa imitation, that person would find his ass on the curb in three seconds. "What the hell is wrong with you?! I got an infant child trying to sleep and you wanna Neil Peart it up in my house?!"

Maybe I'm being a little unfair to "The Little Drummer Boy". Because I find it impossible to think about it without seeing Neil Diamond perform it during his Christmas special. That scene consistently ranks in my Top 50 Worst Things I've Ever Seen. Do you think "You Make It Feel Like Christmas" is the worst holiday-related thing Mr. Diamond has done? Oh, you have no idea.

Sadly, I could find not video of this horror online. But here's audio of the version from Neil's Christmas album. Imagine this accompanied by Neil doing the same kinda moves he did in the "Coming to America" video, while dressed in a similar outfit, and you may understand my hatred.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

The Lexus Christmas ads. Need I say more?

For the last ten years or so (at least it feels like that long), Lexus has run ads every Christmas that feature a brand new car in someone's driveway, topped by a large red bow. That someone is invariably a person you want to hit in the throat with a tree stand.

Over time, these commercials evolved to become even more out of touch. It wasn't enough that the people in these commercials woke up to new luxury sedans on Christmas morning. Now, they were being introduced to said vehicles by means of cutesy, vomit-inducing gimmicks, the kind that, in the real world, would require a huge investment of free time and money. Like a choir of children singing carols on your lawn. Or, they would necessitate other family members "tricking" mom or dad into finding the Lexus in their garage.

Eventually, the ad wizards in charge of this campaign ran out of ways to trick people into finding their new cars. Hence their Christmas spot from two years ago, in which a husband (with the help of his son) engages in the lamest ruse every filmed. You can peep my blow-by-blow review here.

Last year, Lexus had to recognize that times were tough. Even the rich-asshole-iest of the rich assholes coudn't just plop down 50 grand for a car. Or at least they couldn't be spurred to do so by the old Lexus sales pitch. So Lexus took a new tack: Tap into the childlike wonder of Christmas. The ads featured home movie-ish film stock, with children talking about their most beloved toys, most of which were classic toys like Big Wheels and Ataris. Then the ads would cut to the children, all grown up, marveling at their new Lexus with childlike wonderment.

It almost worked. But then they ruined it with one terrible variation on the theme: A little girl talking about getting a pony, and how it made her friends jealous. It still pisses me off just thinking about it, but you can read my fresh anger from last year here.

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

George Michael has much to answer for. When I was a kid, I recall his Faith album being a hot item amongst the sixth grade set for its SHOCKING videos, and providing much preteen giggle fodder with songs like "I Want Your Sex". Who let him write a song with that title? Has anyone whose first language is English ever said that out loud? Was the alternate title "I Am Liking to Make Fuck Party"?

But one of his biggest crimes is the execrable "Last Christmas", a horrible little tune that, much like "Wonderful Christmastime", has received an unwelcome revival in the last few years. I blame those 24-hour holiday radio stations that pop up right after Thanksgiving. Even they can't play "Jingle Bell Rock" every hour, so they had to dig up semi-forgotten Yuletide songs to fill up the spaces between "Blue Christmas" and Ronnie Spector's "Winter Wonderland".

Maybe it's just me. I associate Christmas with being with my family. I don't associate it looking for luv. But in the world of George Michael, Christmas is the day he gives his heart away. Unfortunately, the object of his affection regifted it the day after.

Here's my question, George: What exactly did you expect from someone you met on Christmas? That's not exactly the best day to forge a lasting, loving relationship. "I can't believe someone I met while hanging out at a bar by myself on the biggest family holiday of the year turned out to be a skeeze!"

The original recording of "Last Christmas" is extremely fey and bloodless and full of wimpy synths. But Wham! sounds like the MC5 compared to its cover versions. Just peep the song's Wikipedia page to see some of the winners who've taken on this tune. I defy you to defend any more than three people listed there.

Two stand out: 1) Crazy Frog, because apparently the demon-spawn who created him owned the rights to every song on the planet. 2) Carrie Underwood, because she performed it at the White House. "Merry Christmas, Mr. President! Here's an uplifting song about getting railed during the holidays!"

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

Have you never heard "Christmas Shoes"? If so, I envy you. I remember a time when that song didn't exist. Things seemed so simple. People seemed to laugh more back then.

This song was crafted from an aggressively dumb, particularly American take on spirituality. Namely, that other people's tragedies exist for the sole purpose of making other more fortunate people realize how good they have it. And there is a loving, caring god who steers us toward these moments--even though He doesn't see fit to steer the victims away from their gruesome fates.

What kind of passive aggressive deity would do that? Seriously, if you take five seconds to think through the true implications of such a God ruling and directing the universe, how on earth could you believe in Him? Unless you prescribe to some weird sort of spiritual masochism. It's a variation on the Jack T. Chick brand of Christianity, in which God doesn't do anything to quell the misery and want found on Earth, but can't wait to throw sinners into Hell the second they die.

There are literally thousands of things wrong with this song, on so many levels: musically, philosophically, and theologically. It would take a novel to run through them all. Luckily, Patton Oswalt has done that in less than eight minutes in the video below, accompanied by some excellent animation. (Thanks to TheWhiteBoomBoom for pointing me toward this.)

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

As I alluded to in my previous post, John Lennon bugs me. For a long time, I couldn't quite put my finger on why he bothered me so much. But then I finally figured it out: He thought he had all the answers.

This is the big theme running through his songs: "I've figured out what's going on this little mudball called Earth. If all of you simpletons would just chill out and follow me, you'd all be so much happier." They all point an accusing finger at the rest of humanity, and never at himself. Anyone who questioned him was just some square who didn't vibrate to the same magic wavelength as he and Yoko.

Instant karma's gonna get you. Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can. If you just sat here and watched the wheels with me, everything would seem so simple, man!

I know that a lot of his attitude can be attributed to his troubled upbringing, that it was a product of insecurity and abandonment issues. Even so, he often sounds less like a musical genius and more like a Jim Jones-esque cult leader.

It's even apparent in his relatively benign holiday song, "Happy Christmas (War Is Over)". Musically, it's better than Sir Paul's Yuletide tune. But lyrically, like a lot of Lennon's songs, it has a huge chip on its shoulder.

First line of the song: So this is Christmas/And what have you done? "I don't know what you did for Christmas, but I've recorded a classic holiday song that people will sing 30 years from now. Because I'm a giver. What did you do with your holiday season, huh? Probably just bought a buncha presents and drank egg nog, huh? You make me sick."

And the refrain War is over/If you want it. "Look folks, I've done all the work already. I could make war stop tomorrow in a snap. But you have to want it. I guess you assholes just don't want it bad enough. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go on a journey of introspection and self discovery. Or maybe just check out for a while and get toasted with Harry Nilsson."

For other Holiday Horrors posts, click here.

I like Paul McCartney a lot. He's my favorite Beatle. I think he gets a bad rap merely for outliving John Lennon (who drives me up the wall, as we shall get into in a future post), but I think his solo stuff is much, much better than John's (if you're willing to ignore some of Paul's most glaring clunkers, which I admit is hard to do at times). He's still out there doing it, and whatever criticisms you can make of his newer material, you can't say he's coasting and putting out lazy retreads.

Notwithstanding George Harrison picking up the sitar and Lennon enabling Yoko's screeching, Paul has always been the most musically adventurous of the Fab Four. Sometimes musical adventurousness leads to brilliance like side 2 of Abbey Road. But sometimes it leads to early adoption of questionable new technology, as Sir Paul did in his 1979 holiday tune "Wonderful Christmas Time". Back then, polyphonic synthesizers were in their infancy, and Macca decided he needed to get in on the ground floor of the impending beep-boop revolution.

So he performed most of the song on a (then) brand new keyboard, the Prophet-5. In 1979, it must have seemed very futuristic, since it had a lot of knobs and dials and allowed you to play five whole notes at once. But then again, so did the original Battlestar Galactica and Space Invaders. With the Beatles, McCartney made timeless music, but this song is definitely the product of a very specific timeframe--and should have stayed there.

Unfortunately, this tune has received an undeserved revival in the past few years. I never heard this song as a kid, and then all of a sudden it reemerged from the depths of Moog-ville five or six years ago. I think much of its renewed appreciation is ironic, from a generation that thinks huge cell phones and dial-up modems are hysterical.

Truth be told, this song is not that bad at its core. From a pure musical standpoint, it's not great, but it's not terrible either. It's cute, inoffensive, even fun at times. Unfortunately, to get to this core you have to wave through a chorus of toy laser guns. If Nerf made instruments, this is what they would sound like.

Some people dig vintage synthesizers. These people are insane. Maybe nostalgia gives you a soft spot for Atari, but deep in your heart you know it pales in comparison to the PS3. Preferring the synthesizers of 1979 to today's models is like preferring an outhouse to indoor plumbing.

I hope someday McCartney decides to re-record this with a real band. Or at least with instruments that don't sound like miked styrofoam.

In Scratchbomb days of yore, I used to write one post around this time every year about terrible holiday garbage. I actually love the holidays and many holiday-related things, but there are certain aspects of it that cut through me like a knife. Only a few of them are Lexus ads.

This year, I realized there's so much hideousness to go around that I could do a post a day until Xmas covering bad holiday junk. Kind of like an Advent calendar of hate. Today's inaugural entry: Bob Dylan's Christmas in the Heart.

I've softened in my opinion of Robert Zimmerman over the years. Time was, I reflexively hated him because I lumped him in with hippies (who I still think are some of the worst human beings on the planet) and dismissed him without actually having heard much of his music. But then I wound up listening to other artists who love him, so I eventually came to respect him as a songwriter and personality. He's one of those rare artists who gets to do whatever he wants, and has little or no interest in anyone else's opinion of his work (see also: Neil Young).

But even if a person is a genius, that doesn't mean everything they've done is a genius product. Dylan has issued a few clunkers in his career (Self Portrait, the out-of-nowhere born again albums). And I don't know if you've noticed this, but he's gotten a little weird lately.

First it was the creepy Victoria's Secret ads, with Dylan leering at lingerie models around corners. Then came his oppressively literal XM Radio show, Theme Time Radio Hour, in which he simply played songs relating to one theme or another. This year, he launched an odd, OCD-inspired tour in which he only played minor league baseball stadiums.

Based on his recent career decisions, I've gotten the distinct impression that Dylan's latest quest is to become a sort of Leon Redbone/Tom Waits hybrid. Playing vaguely old timey music in a fedora and suit while sporting a John Waters mustache, cultivating a disheveled, semi-inebriated persona. His arrest in Long Branch this past summer after being mistaken for a vagrant was in line with this theory.

What really convinced me that Dylan was headed in this direction was his recently-released holiday album, Christmas in the Heart. To be fair, they're certainly not the worst Christmas songs I've ever heard, and 100% of Dylan's album royalties go toward world hunger-related charities, so at least it was done for a good cause.

But I would contend that no artist as respected and worshiped as Dylan has put out such a Monkey Wrench Album as this one. A Monkey Wrench Album is a collection fans have to convince themselves is worthy among placement with his best work. At least the aforementioned clunkers have their partisans or defenders. Now, Dylan apologists have the unenviable task of trying to place Christmas in the Heart alongside Blood on the Tracks and Blonde on Blonde.

Have you heard Bruce Springsteen's hideous song "Outlaw Pete" from his last album? Imagine an entire album of that, with Dust Bowl instrumentation, and you've got Christmas in the Heart. Add in Dylan's reedy, scraggly voice and you've got good ol' fashioned nightmare fuel. With Dylan's pipes, it doesn't matter what he's actually saying; he'll always sound like he wants you to get in the back of his van. The weirdest part of it is, I think that's exactly what he wants to sound like. And why not? He's really good at it.

The video for "Must Be Santa " should give you an idea of the album's aesthetic. When you go to a holiday party at Dylan's house (which, on the inside, vaguely resembles the Parkers' house in A Christmas Story), make sure to show up in your finest Jazz Age duds. Also know that some guy will start a fight, throw crystal at people, swing on a chandelier, and throw himself out a window. All while Dylan himself appears and disappears at will, looking like a more decrepit version of Eric Stoltz in True Romance.



But keep in mind, this is easily--easily--the best song on the album. For its true horror, you have to delve into tracks like "Here Comes Santa Claus", given sinister new meaning by Dylan's ruined croak. And when he sings "Do You Hear What I Hear?", I imagine he's saying it to distract you while he clubs you in the back of the head and drags you into a ditch.

Look: Dylan's an icon and, again, this album is totally for charity. But his voice on these songs is like wrapping a candy cane in razor wire and shoving it down your ear canal. The only reason this album hasn't zipped onto the top of my Holiday Hate List is because it'll help alleviate world hunger. Not just through the funds it raises, but because it will also nauseate everyone forced to hear it.