It’s a busy Friday, so today’s Christmas song is a quick one. Paul McCartney just released his new isolation album, “McCartney III,” let’s go back to the 1979 song you either love or hate … “Wonderful Christmastime.”
I’ll spare you covers by MF Doom, Harry Styles, and Chicago with Dolly Parton. Instead, here’s Macca and Martin Short, aka “Caleb and Monte” with a new Christmas song from SNL 2012 … and something familiar at the end.
Building off yesterday’s song, here’s another Christmas tune that proves the holidays aren’t always sugarplums and mistletoe. In 1989, “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight Tonight)” was the last song on side two of The Ramones’ “Brain Drain.” Not a bad place for a Christmas song when the album comes out in March.
“Brain Drain” was the album that brought Marky Ramone back into the band, but also was the last one with Dee Dee Ramone. Dee Dee has since said he didn’t play bass on “Brain Drain,” and while he’s in the video for “Pet Semetery,” he’s replaced with C.J. Ramone for “Merry Christmas.”
I’ve been writing about a Christmas song each day for a couple weeks, but so far, no music from 2020. That changes today with Carly Rae Jepsen’s “It’s Not Christmas Till Somebody Cries” – and you don’t know how hard it was for me to not replace “Till” with “‘Til.”
Jepson’s carved out a solid career since first breaking big with 2012’s “Call Me Maybe” – three Top 40 singles, “Cinderella” on Broadway, Frenchy in “Grease: Live,” the theme song for “Fuller House”… Now, her first original Christmas song.
Today’s Christmas song – one a day until December 25 – is Lou Monte’s “Dominick the Donkey.” Lou made a career out of Italian-American novelty records, most popular in New York and New Jersey. First released in 1960, “Dominick the Donkey” is about how Santa has a donkey because reindeer aren’t so good at climbing the peaks of Italy. The song also implies Santa’s workshop is actually in “Brook-a-leen.”
Today’s classic Christmas song is “Last Christmas” from Wham!, which looks fantastic on YouTube. In 2019, the original clip got a 4K digital makeover. “Last Christmas” was shot on film, so director Andy Morahan was able to find most of the original footage and get it rescanned at higher resolution. A few shots were missing, so they were up-rezzed and improved as much as possible. Other than the haircuts and clothes, the video looks like it was shot last week and not 1984.