Sorry...
RIP Burl...
Posted on 12/12/2014 6:58:00 AM PST by C19fan
On Oct. 24 at 6:24 p.m., Magic 96.5 in Birmingham, Alabama, flipped its “St. Nick” switch. The soft-rock radio station began playing all holiday music all the time.
Magic 96.5 (WMJJ-FM) was one of the first stations in 2014 to give listeners exactly what they want at year’s end: more the Madonna than Madonna. In fact, there’s an entire library of songs that are in constant demand now, but people cringe if they hear them months before.
Radio’s wall-to-wall holiday format is a recent development. Of course, stations in the past played some Christmas music on Dec. 24 and 25, but the vast majority of soft-rock stations began switching to all-holiday soundtracks in the 1990s. The first to throw out its regular playlist entirely was 99.9 KEZ (KESZ-FM) in Phoenix, in 1991 or 1992.1 The variety station saw a substantial jump in its ratings, and the trend eventually caught on nationwide.
(Excerpt) Read more at fivethirtyeight.com ...
I love Christmas but here on 12/12 I’m about at the point where hearing Burl Ives Holly Jolly Christmas one more time will drive me over the top...LOL
I’m glad this is happening. It is the one and only part of our culture that is moving more in the direction of honoring Christmas. Not just some nonsense “holiday season.” And the songs include overtly Christian religious songs — Oh, Holy Night, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear. I love it. If I get sick of hearing Johnny Mathis, Andy Williams or Burl Ives, there are other stations I can turn to for a while.
There are only a few Christmas songs that I truly enjoy...”Little Drummer Boy” being at the top of that list.In the car I only listen to talk radio and the music I have stored on my hard drive so I don’t care what soft rock stations...or any other stations...are playing.
Don't let brainless radio stations dictate your Christmas music content. And avoid the execrable "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" at all cost!
Pandora offers a good set of choices for Christmas music. I use Shuffle to mix
“Vince Guaraldi Tri (Holiday)”
“Christmas Radio”
“Christmas Traditional Radio”
which gives a good selection of oldies and fresh stuff (about 80%/20%), after tweaking it with thumbs up/down.
Better than the radio with barking dogs doing Jingle Bells every hour.
I became burned out on Christmas years ago, being endlessly bombarded with the same music is part of the reason why.
The HJC song became special for my cousin and myself when
two years ago traveling at Christmas, we kept hearing it.
At one point, we changed the channel 7 or 8 times,
EVERY time tuning into Holly Jollly. It cracked us up,
there was NO ESCAPE! so now we listen for it every year.
I’m kinda partial to the Hippo song myself, and can’t stand
Little Drummer boy, I mean Jean Krupa playing to a little
baby trying to sleep? Come on, the parents would have broken
it over his head...
I’ve noticed that our local station likes to play songs about “peace” and “romance”.
Not so much about the reason for the season...there are a few, but they’re getting squeezed out with songs like the abhorrent “Imagine”, and songs about missing or being away from lovers at Christmas.
I’ve called the station out a couple of times about Imagine and its variants because it’s purely socialist tripe.
“Imagine there’s no heaven, it’s easy if you try...”
I was a DJ in the 70's and we would play a song or two an hour beginning the Friday after Thanksgiving. The closer we got to Christmas, the heavier the Christmas themed songs grew in number in the rotation. But we never went 100% Christmas until Christmas Eve. The wall to wall Christmas music would continue overnight and through about noon Christmas day. After noon, the music began to transition back to the regular format and would diminish over the next few days. Most songs played after Christmas were more holiday music centered than Christmas. No Santa tunes. No Away in a Manger. Songs like Sleigh Ride and Most Wonderful Time of the Year.
The other “oddity” is artists who would have little chance to make the airwaves today are front and center. Bing Crosby, Jimmy Durante, Andy Williams, Burl Ives and others get a great deal of air time on stations that would turn their noses up at them any other time of the year.
The Restroom Door Said Gentlemen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlIs27Z5Hrk
Make it So, Make it So, Make it So
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrG4JnrN5GA
("...shut up, Wesley...!" makes me laugh every time!)
Tiny Tim’s “Santa Claus has got the Aids This Year” is a good antidote
How did Christmas get stuck with such absolutely terrible music? I am a great hater of “Christmas”. I like Christmas, though.
The irony of the playlist is that stations are so “format controlled” that they miss out on the 90% of Christmas music that is “Classical”. Yet the Classical stations are usually run by the NPR crowd, and dislike anything Christmas.
You hate “Drummer Boy”? Do I hate that song? Yes, with a hatred complete.
“I became burned out on Christmas years ago, being endlessly bombarded with the same music is part of the reason why.”
I know what you mean... I went to Walmart just before Halloween to pick up a soaker hose in the garden section only to find that all garden supplies had mysteriously disappeared and had been replaced with ‘Christmas’ STUFF. The area had ‘Chrismas’ music playing as well. After my initial shock and disbelief subsided, I realized I’d better high tail it out of there before an ear worm had a chance to infect me!!!
Someone mentioned “Holly Jolly Christmas” up thread and now it’s stuck in my head. The song that seems to be playing in every single store I enter is “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies”. I really tire of the ear worms.
Sorry...
RIP Burl...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Dec9Jb_Ac4
I had never heard of Jack Jezzro so I looked it up on YouTube. The whole album is there. I played one song and it's continued to play each of the other songs. Great music to have playing in the background! Thanks for mentioning it.
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