White Christmas, December 9: Darlene Love

I don’t know what’s oddest about this – the beach setting, the headwear, or the fact that the usually-left-off intro is spoken over a middle instrumental section. But it’s a bona-fide Wall Of Sound rendering nonetheless, and a suitably upbeat start to what will probably be the last week before Christmas where we all still have to go to work every day and look as though we’re actually paying attention.