Month: December 2008

Advent song for December 18

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Films, Music

Watching this again sent shivers up my spine.  I think we always used to watch The Snowman on Christmas Eve, so for me it’s inextricably tied up with the tingling excitement of waiting for Christmas Day.  I’ve chosen the original version from the cartoon rather than Aled Jones’s slightly more famous version, because the cartoon is still great and I think everyone should watch it again.  The little touches – the whale, the northern lights – really make it.  Although I still don’t understand why they fly over Brighton, since they end up at the North Pole and you can’t possibly start south of Brighton if you live in England, which judging by his nightwear this little boy definitely does.

Advent song for December 17

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Music, Reasons to be cheerful

I had no plans to include this song, but it popped into my head this morning and hasn’t left, so here it is.  I don’t think I’d ever seen the video, but I like it very much because everybody in it seems so happy.  Whatever you think about Paul and Linda, I think they were very much in love, and you can see it here.  Also, I like that the “choir of children” is actually them.  It reminds me of the story Paul told about auditioning children to voice the part of Rupert in the full-length video for We All Stand Together, and all of them were so rubbish that he ended up doing it himself.

Advent song for December 14

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Films, Music, Reasons to be cheerful

I knew this was the song I wanted for today, but I didn’t know which version I wanted, so this morning I engaged in a bit of research.  Things I didn’t know before include that this song is from a film, that it was written in 1949 and that it won the best song Oscar the following year.  There’s a very charming version from 1951 featuring Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Jordan, and there will always be a place in my heart for the Miss Piggy/Rudolf Nuryev cover, but because it’s the original and best, here are Ricardo Montalban and Esther Williams in Neptune’s Daughter (I’d never heard of it either) with Baby It’s Cold Outside.

Advent song for December 13

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Music, Reasons to be cheerful

What I like about this is that it’s an attempt to emulate the glitz and pomp of the glam rock Christmas classics from the 1970s, and it more or less succeeds.  That the song hasn’t passed into Christmas legend isn’t its fault: it’s genuinely good.  It stopped being fashionable to like The Darkness, but for a few months there they were, in their own way, very good indeed.  And this video has everything, including a children’s choir and a Christmas message at the end.  What more could you want?  A penis reference, you say?  It’s got that too.  Enjoy.

Advent song for December 12

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Reasons to be cheerful

All David Bowie’s duets are odd, but this is the oddest.  (Not including that one from Labyrinth which he sings with a monster.)  What makes this, of course, is the bizarrely stilted run-up, which is reminiscent of nothing so much as the early scenes of a 1970s porn film.

Hi, I’m David Bowie, I live down the road

…

What sort of music do you play?

Oh, mostly…contemporary stuff – do you like modern music?

Oh, I think it’s marvellous.

Genius.