sounds of the season

i've often got a few things rattling around in my head that i think would make good posts. this one's been brewing for a few weeks, but got tabled because of the events of this past week. time to pull it out, if for no other reason than to transition to a sense of normalcy and restore some brightness back to this blog.

i'm a big fan of christmas music, and have assembled what i think to be a pretty decent collection. i thought it would be easy to do a "top 5 christmas songs" post, but then as i started to compile my list, i realized how hard a task it was (bing's "white christmas" is by christmas law supposed to be #1 on every list, but i couldn't put it even in my top 5). i tried breaking it up into traditional and modern lists, but even that had too many crossovers (elvis' "blue christmas"- traditional? not exactly an old english carol there. sting's "gabriel's message"- modern? the song's got its roots in medieval times).

so, i decided to make the list of "top 5 christmas carols", whereby "top" is defined as "most likely to give me the warm-all-over christmas fuzzies". here we go:

5) "must be santa", mitch miller & the gang: if you grew up with a mitch miller album like i did, you know this is on your list too. back when we'd stack 5 LP's on the turntable, and they'd drop down one after the other, then we'd flip them over to hear side B on all of them, this was the song that the arm got lifted back and the needle replaced so we could hear it over and over.
4) "christmas must be tonight", robbie robertson: i love this song. i remember hearing it in the christmas rotation on WBAB, long island's finest rock station, and found it on a compilation disc a few years back. great lyrics, pleasant melody, way better than that paul mccartney song.
3) "i believe in father christmas", emerson, lake and palmer: at the risk of coming off like some classic rock geek, this was also one i picked up an appreciation for thanks to WBAB. got this one off yet another random christmas compilation.
2) "(there's no place like) home for the holidays", perry como: this is always the first christmas song i listen to every year. i won't allow myself to listen to christmas music before thanksgiving, and usually at some time on black friday, i'll pull out this song and put it on. i think my love for this one goes back to a 4th grade chorus concert.
1) "rockin' around the christmas tree", brenda lee: we didn't have this song on LP as kids, but it certainly got its fair share of radio airplay. i always liked it a little, but after "home alone", it became my favorite song of the season. (that movie for me is a classic, and i absolutely love the scene with him dancing by the tree to this song, with his bb gun over his shoulder and the cardboard cutouts moving by on the toy train.) never feel more christmasy than when i'm swingin' to this song.

honorable mentions: "do they know it's christmas", band aid, "twelve days of christmas", john denver and the muppets (by far the absolute best version of this song- "BA-DUM-BUM-BUM"), "i saw three ships", sting

intentionally left off: "white christmas", bing crosby (see above), "little drummer boy/peace on earth", david bowie and bing crosby (got nuthin' but love for bing, but this song just doesn't do it for me), "father christmas", the kinks (fun, but not fun enough)

if you managed to get through all that, and still care enough to leave a comment with your top few, be my guest. remember, though- my blog. i always win.