If We Make it Through December: 5 Songs About Fighting on Christmas
This week's songs are from The Hives & Cindi Lauper, the Ramones, Frightened Rabbit, Andrew Bird, and Glen Hansard & Lisa O'Neill
I’m conflicted about Christmas music. The music I loved as a kid still triggers all of the best memories of being a kid around Christmas. Pretty much anything else is extremely grating and obnoxious. I think this is because:
It’s actually not that great of a holiday once you’re an adult. It’s Thanksgiving with more pressure and more chores. There’s no magic to it anymore. As in Polar Express, at some point you stop hearing the bells from Santa’s sleigh.
Christmas music knows this, which is why so many Christmas songs are sad. The happy ones work overtime to play up that happiness, so we can all pretend to still believe the hype. It’s forced fun.
Christmas music is really picked-over terrain. There’s the classics, Mariah Carey, and a whole heap of trash from people trying to re-work the classics.
Knowing that, it’s hard to find fresh Christmas music. But for a fresh take, let’s explore a sub-genre: the Christmas Fight Song.
There are significantly more pressures on people around Christmas than Thanksgiving. Gifting, traditions, social obligations, travel—the holiday is a minefield for families, couples, and if it’s Black Friday, strangers at the mall who have the toy you want for your kid. And yet, the “How to Avoid Fighting With Your Family” articles that flood the internet around Thanksgiving are nowhere to be found on Christmas. Chances are, people might need some new strategies for Round 2. Do these journalists and mental health influencers think people don’t fight around Christmas?
Maybe they should talk to rock musicians.
The anti-Christmas song—one of the more famous of Christmas Music sub-genres—is meant to trash the whole idea of Christmas cheer. But Christmas fight songs are the opposite. They embrace the conventions of holiday music, often desperately cling to hope against all odds, and plead for the joy and peace commonly referred to as “the Christmas Spirit.” These are songs sung by people who need Christmas.
Here are 5 Songs about fighting on Christmas.
“There is something about spending Christmas alone, naked, sitting by the Christmas tree gripping a shotgun, that lets you know your life is spinning dangerously out of control.” - Nikki Sixx
The Hives & Cindi Lauper - “A Christmas Duel”
Swedish garage rockers the Hives partner with Cindi Lauper for the epic showdown of two equally terrible people depicted in “A Christmas Duel.” It’s a showcase for the Hives’ ability to tap into the retro-soul elements of the mid-60s garage rock era that is modus operandi. The song is a funny, filthy homage to the Phil Spector Christmas collection that succeeds for the most part. The contents of the song sound more like Phil Spector’s actual life than it does the music he made. There’s cheating, stealing, substance abuse, and even a hired hitman between these two, but the holiday cheer is so overwhelming that it brings them together:
So whatever you say, it's all fine by me
And who the fuck anyway wants a Christmas tree
Cause the snow keeps on fallin'
Even though we were bad
It'll cover the filth
We should both just be glad
The Ramones- “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight)”
Maybe the original Christmas fight song? Given it’s the Ramones, it also has a bit of Phil Spector’s influence in it. The video starts off with a cartoonish fight from a bickering couple before the song kicks in. Apparently it was inspired by Linda Ramone, who dated Joey, broke his heart, and would eventually go on to marry Johnny Ramone. What’s special about this song, ironically, is how un-special it is. It doesn’t deviate much from the amped-up charm the Ramones are known for. The original demo, which was recently released as a 7” single, was slower, paced like a doo-wop shuffle. But the pivot towards their typical formula may have something to do with the in-fighting among the band around the time of recording. Joey was open to expanding their sound, while everyone was was insistent on keeping it to guitars, bass, and drums. Joey would later go on to cover “(Christmas) Baby Please Come Home” with the bells, back up singers, grand piano and a sax solo that make the original so great.
Frightened Rabbit - “It’s Christmas So We’ll Stop”
Like “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight),” this song from Frightened Rabbit is fully within the band’s typical wheelhouse. The Scottish indie rockers were known for their poetic laments about fracturing relationships. Here, singer and songwriter Scott Hutchison is begging for the spirit of the holidays to fix a broken relationship, calling on our better natures to forgive and forget not just for one day, but from that day forward. It’s earnest, but also pretty desperate. Based on what little detail you hear, there isn’t much chance for this couple.
Ah, it's Christmas so we'll stop
'Cause the wine on our breath puts the love in our tongues
So forget the names
I called you on Christmas Eve
In fact forget the entire year
Don't reflect, just pretend and you won't feel scared
You won't feel a thing
'Cause it's all been tucked away
“The Handsome Family are like a default thing for me. They’ve always been a touchstone to remind myself what strong writing is. Every six months I learn one of their songs just to remind myself how good they are.” - Andrew Bird
Andrew Bird - “Greenwine” (the Handsome Family Cover)
As the pandemic forced much of the world to stay home, Andrew Bird took that time wondering if and when people would be able to even get together by Christmas. That wondering sparked Hark! his wonderfully warm album of Christmas-adjacent covers. Here, he’s merged the Handsome Family’s “So Much Wine,” with “Greensleeves,” into “Greenwine.” While the former is a song about one half of a couple offering something of an intervention to the other after a particularly epic Christmas Day outburst, the latter is an English traditional folk song that was re-interpreted into Christmas music as far back as the 17th century. Bird has said of the Handsome Family, “they do what the best songs can do: Condense all this meaning into the fewest possible words.” What’s striking about Bird’s version of the song is how much he says without any additional words. The interpolation of the “Greensleeves” melody into the story in “So Much Wine” turns it even darker; it becomes a timeless fable destined to repeat itself.
Glen Hansard & Lisa O’Neill - “Fairytale of New York” (the Pogues Cover)
“Fairytale of New York” doesn’t sound like the title of a Christmas song, but the opening line makes it clear.
“It’s Christmas Eve, babe/ In the drunk tank”
What follows after the scene-setting is the before-and-after of a couple who fell in love, but are now bitter and spiteful. It’s a whirlwind of a song, swinging from happiness to misery and back. As “the bells ring out for Christmas Day” in the celebratory chorus, it’s not entirely clear if this couple have reconciled, and the man might still be in the drunk tank.
The Pogues’ Shane MacGowan, who wrote and sang the original “Fairytale of New York,” was born on Christmas Day. He died on November 30th last year. As with services for many legendary musicians, the funeral turned into something of a tribute concert. Given it was Christmastime when those services were held, “Fairytale of New York” was the song of the moment. I’ve opted to share the version performed there by Glen Hansard, Lisa O’Neill, and members of the Pogues for those needing further evidence that the Irish know how to celebrate anything better than anyone. Look no further than the couples getting out of their pews for a dance. To a song about a bitter couple. At a funeral. Are they brought together by the spirit of Christmas? Or is it the music finding its way into their hearts?
Thanks for reading. Enjoy the listening. Merry Christmas.