Don’t Touch My Christmas Music, You Big Grinch

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Thanksgiving is over. By any and all standards accepted in modern society, now is the appropriate time to start listening to it. I’ll be honest, I usually start during my Thanksgiving preparations, but to each his own. If I get on the boat a little bit early, that doesn’t mean it’s not stopping to pick you up a few days later. And now, the Christmas music era, if you will, is truly the greatest time of all.

As I write this, I’m listening to Billy Gilman (you remember, the blonde child singer-prodigy, essentially the singing version of the little kid from Jerry Maguire) singing “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” and it is the sonic incarnation of pure happiness. What music other than this is so shamelessly peppy, happy, child-like, and steeped in its own delightful overproduction? None, that’s what. This is the kind of music that one just smiles and nods to as they listen to it. Everyone — from Celine to Whitney to Barbara to Frank to Dean — has their own chipper version of every song, and each one is more wonderful than the last. Don’t like this cover of “Winter Wonderland?” Fear not, there exist 103982308432823 others to take its place in your heart.

And everywhere, from the grocery store to the skating ring, is playing these adorable songs. Everywhere you go becomes a delightful little holiday moment, everywhere just makes you want to eskimo kiss under some mistletoe while wearing a scarf and believing deeply in Santa Claus. It is, if you’ll allow me the reference, the most wonderful time of the year.

But then there are those terrible, horrible people who spend the Christmas season in a pouty, Grinch-y state of discontent as they bemoan every song they hear. “It’s non-stop” they say, “it’s everywhere.” Good, I think. And frankly, is it so hard to have one measly month a year in which songs are about loving your neighbor and being happy for what you have? If you can honestly listen to Frank Sinatra singing “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” and think, “Turn that crap off. It’s offending my ears,” you are a terrible person. That is the litmus test of a good person, and you have failed. Congratulations.

I cannot tell you the number of times people have chastised me for playing the music of the season, asking me if I didn’t get “enough” of it in shopping malls (as if there could be such a thing as “enough”). I would like to take this moment to tell those people, collectively, go away. Wham! and I are going to be talking about giving our heart to someone special this year, and you can sit in the corner and listen to your sad summer music and hate happiness.

And, if you get a big lump of coal in your stocking this year, I will be completely indifferent.

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image – Laura Bittnard