the important christmas list (revisited)
The problem with making any list concerning music is that something will always be left out. There will always be a glaring omission in your desert island collection that waits to avail itself just when you’ve crawled on shore and broken out the boom box and unlimited supply of batteries (or however it is that you account for the power source). These lists are seemingly meaningless, though lovers of music will agonize over them as if their composition was as significant to our individuality as DNA or that time we accidentally killed a hobo and buried him in the backyard.
So I knew that the list I left on Newton's blog last week was less than perfect and that some embarrassingly neglected Christmas song would somehow find me between then and December 25th.
Indeed it did. The prophecy was fulfilled last weekend when Otis Redding’s “Merry Christmas, Baby” came on the radio. He was one of the great singers with that ability to reach through the speakers and down your ear canal to grab your soul by the throat, and this song is the complete antithesis of those cold and impersonal sounds of Manheim Steamroller.* It certainly belongs at or near the top of my list.
But the other problem with musical lists is that they are fluid. What sits at number five today could either be off the list or at number one tomorrow. Bearing all this in mind, here are my top five Christmas songs at this particular moment in time.
1. “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby
2. “Merry Christmas, Baby” by Otis Redding
3. “Baby Please Come Home” by Darline Love
4. “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” by Dean Martin
5. “Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues
*Which isn’t to say that even Manheim Steamroller doesn’t have its place. Some family gatherings require that sort of thing.
So I knew that the list I left on Newton's blog last week was less than perfect and that some embarrassingly neglected Christmas song would somehow find me between then and December 25th.
Indeed it did. The prophecy was fulfilled last weekend when Otis Redding’s “Merry Christmas, Baby” came on the radio. He was one of the great singers with that ability to reach through the speakers and down your ear canal to grab your soul by the throat, and this song is the complete antithesis of those cold and impersonal sounds of Manheim Steamroller.* It certainly belongs at or near the top of my list.
But the other problem with musical lists is that they are fluid. What sits at number five today could either be off the list or at number one tomorrow. Bearing all this in mind, here are my top five Christmas songs at this particular moment in time.
1. “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby
2. “Merry Christmas, Baby” by Otis Redding
3. “Baby Please Come Home” by Darline Love
4. “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” by Dean Martin
5. “Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues
*Which isn’t to say that even Manheim Steamroller doesn’t have its place. Some family gatherings require that sort of thing.
posted by Rex L. Camino at 8:38 AM
4 Comments:
o.k. i'll make a "christmas island" list.
here goes!
1) Father Christmas - the Kinks
2) Christmastime is here - Vince Ghiraldi
3) Happy X-mas (war is over) - John Lennon
4) Ho,Ho,Ho, would be a turkey at Christmas - Elton John
5) Always Winter and Never Christmas - XTC
6) GreenSleeves - John Coltrane
7) Another Lonely Christmas - Prince
8) Santa's Beard - They Might Be Giants
9) Jacob Marley - Bonzo dog Band
10)Little Drummer Boy - Bowie and Crosby
...ok, i like lists too. meaningless fun is sometimes the best kind.
Happy Christmas humbuggers!
Damn! The Bowie/Crosby duet is another one I always forget about.
Damn it again!
...and I was just listening to the great Esquivel the other day.
Thanks, Huck.
A couple of songs on my "Christmas island" list are Merry Christmas to the Family by Robert Earl Keen and a very old rendition of Rudolph by Fred Waring and the Pennsylvanians...it is very entertaining indeed.
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