Five Song Friday: My Christmas Conspiracy Theory
This Week: Smuggling Shellfish, Musical Ignorance and Rascal Royalty
You asked for my favorite Christmas song and I have one.
But you’re not going to like the answer.
My favorite Christmas song is silence.
Give me the dull, low hum of nothing. Fill the air with icy quiet.
Shut everything up except the ringing in my ears and the chatter in my head.
I don’t want to hear Bruce Springsteen mumbling about Santa.
Maria Carey can squeak like a dolphin to someone else about her Christmas list.
And if you’re an indie singer under 30 with an acoustic guitar? Please… don’t.
I’m not a Scrooge, but so much schmaltz is unhealthy. All day, every day, with the holiday hokum and Kris Kringle kumbaya?
It’s like an Uma Thurman shot-in-the-heart of sugar, spice and everything nice.
I get it. Sometimes there’s nothing better than dumping a Santa-sized bag of pure holiday nostalgia onto your desk and snorfing it Scarface-style.
We love the warm fuzzies. We love happy memories and feeling like a kid again.
But Christmas songs have a hidden agenda.
Decorations go up earlier every year. Stores change the music at 11:59 on Thanksgiving night. And we all just go with the flow like it’s no big deal.
Something feels wrong.
Baristas at Starbucks call me by name even though I didn’t tell them. I trade my email address for coupons and discounts. And some guy at Best Buy offered to upgrade my COVID vaccine micro-chip implant to the Intel Z790 free with the purchase of an Alexa Pillow that can upload my dreams to the cloud.
That seems weird, right?
The only thing that makes sense is that holiday songs are part of Phase One in a bigger plan.
They sell us on the mythology of the Christmas season, lull us into a false sense of security. They tug on our emotions with lyrics about love and family and fireplaces and shit.
It’s all paving the way for a big reveal.
I haven’t got it figured out yet, but here’s a start…
“They” slowly extend the holiday season until it consumes almost half the year. We go along, because who doesn’t love an extra 5 months of feeling good about your fellow man?
Black Friday is moved to the beginning of July. And because people can’t cope with so much anticipation, Congress passes an amendment to certify the 25th of EVERY month as Christmas Day.
Gift card companies and tree farms rejoice. Big box stores lose their goddamn mind. And EVERY song becomes a Christmas song.
EVERY movie becomes a Christmas movie and includes a scene suggesting that Santa “might” be real after all.
We eat it up. The madness and marketing of the holiday season never ends. People work long, brutal hours simply to earn enough money to buy each other slippers, novelty coffee mugs and small appliances. Pumpkin spice never leaves. Christmas lights are hardwired into all new homes.
You may ask, “What’s so bad about living in a magical Hallmark Channel holiday world?”
GREAT question. Thanks for asking.
What’s bad is what happens on December 25, 2029.
In the early morning hours, somebody somewhere makes a phone call to set “Operation Naughty” into motion.
Millions of trained mercenaries are dispatched by jetpack to every home in America.
In the dark, soldiers dressed like “Santa Claus” shimmy down our extra-wide chimneys (made mandatory on all homes in 2026 and built extra-wide for vague “environmental” reasons).
“Santa Rambo” enjoys a treat of cookies and milk and collects the Social Security cards and passports placed beside the snack (also made mandatory in 2026 to prevent undocumented citizens from getting gifts meant for Americans).
Then he attaches a Mind Control Collar to us while we sleep.
We wake up in the morning to a brand new Authoritarian US of A.
In this future, all men, women and children are forced to work in quarries and dig for oil. Some are sent to toil in the avocado fields. The luckiest ones get to labor in factories building smartphones and MyPillows.
And when it comes to music, we have two choices…
“Last Christmas” by Wham or… death.
Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Happy Holidays!
Sincerely,
DJ CrankyPete
Five Song Friday 043
“Oysters In My Pocket” - Royel Otis
First of all, putting oysters in your pocket is a terrible idea. Especially if you’re wearing good pants. The shells are rough and dirty. And there’s a good reason that shuckers wear protective gloves. Them things is sharp. Cavemen used oyster shells for weapons. They don’t call them “the Ginsu knives of nature” for nothing!
And if you have oysters in your pocket that are OUT of the shell? That’s just gross.
“Hellodrama” - What Made Milwaukee Famous
Here’s a question: What made What Made Milwaukee Famous famous?
Because it certainly wasn’t this song. Or any of their songs. What I’m saying is that I’d never heard of this band before now.
Not a big deal. It’s a big music world out there and I can’t know everything. I don’t know the difference between Da Baby, Da Brat and Da Uzi. I lived most of my life thinking there was a guy named Lynyrd Skynyrd. And if you pointed a gun at me and told me to name the 10 current members of Chicago, I would just start crying.
That said, this song is great. I’m sorry it took me 16 years to find it. But the past is the past, and the present is a gift, so… thank you for my present.
“Kilo” - Bonde Do Role
I can’t understand a word of this song.
There’s an English version available but that feels like cheating. It sounds much better in a language that I can’t understand.
That’s why I always choose subtitles over dubbed versions of movies.
You may feel differently, and that’s fine. But you’re also wrong and a bad person.
“Crown of Age” - The Ettes
I’d like the idea of a “Crown of Age,” if it was an actual crown that you got to wear once you reached a certain age. That would be awesome and make me not as sad about getting old.
Hard to not give props to folks wearing a crown, right? I mean, I met the Burger King once and I KNEW he was just a guy in a costume with a plastic head… but I got on my knees and kissed his ring anyway. It seemed like the right thing to do.
Giving crowns to senior citizens could help us as a society do a better job of respecting our elders. It would help them stand out from the crowd. I suppose you could make the argument that Rascal scooters and motorized shopping carts do the same thing. But not really.
Any time I see one of those, I just get jealous that I still have to walk using my stupid idiot legs.
“Stuck!” - Bull
Did someone ask for a ridiculously fun and catchy song that you can do a stupid dance to while wearing wireless head phones in the privacy of your home office? Did you want it to sound like Pavement and Cake making sweet, sweet musical love?
Done and done!
Listen on Spotify
Listen on YouTube Music
Your Christmas Bonus has arrived!
My 16-year-old daughter asked me to share this song. She said that it’s important and people needed to hear it. You can watch the video here.
That’s all for now. Thanks for reading!
“Virtually every writer I know would rather be a musician.” - Kurt Vonnegut