[Video: Steve Martin, Edie Brickell, and the Steep Canyon Rangers, “The Strangest Christmas Yet.” You can pop open a transcript of the lyrics here.]
Want to visit the pages for earlier playlists, which include videos, other songs, and some background material not in the “official” current list? Here y’go:
2008 | 2009 | |
2010 | 2011 | |
2012 | 2013 | |
2014 | 2015 | |
2016 | 2017 |
As always beginning in 2008, I’ve added ten new songs; the list therefore now includes 110 songs (well, the first just a scrap of dialogue). Total time required to listen to the whole thing, start-to-finish: now just shy of six hours. This means that — unless you’re interested in only this year’s ten — the best way to play the whole things is in random order, as background so to speak. Here’s the magic button to do that: click on it, and the mix pops open in a separate little window, and will start to play automatically (if you’re not happy with the order, close the pop-up window and click the button again):
Pop Out to Shuffle!
Alternatives, if you don’t want the randomized sequence:
A plain old chronologically-accurate playlist — no pop-up and no random sequence, just start to finish (although you can open it in a pop-out window by clicking (duh) the little “Popout” button at the top left):
A Quirky/Eclectic Christmas Mix (Complete)
…and here are the ten 2018 selections only. As with the complete list, this player just runs through the songs in sequential order, with no shuffle mode:
A Quirky/Eclectic Christmas Mix (2018 Only)
In any case, or even if you don’t want to listen at all, you might want to glance at the complete current list of song titles and performers. (Note: this is just a listing; you cannot play music from it.)
Now — not that you’re actively wondering — why the “recommended” method of listening (pop-out and shuffle, using the special link so labeled above), rather than listen to the songs in order? Well, as I said, this is the eleventh year for which I’ve done a Christmas-music post. Two specific implications of this fact (cribbed, almost verbatim, from last year’s post):- In that time, I’ve started exhausting the back catalogue of music I remember from days gone by, and have begun to rely on suggestions from other sites, on songs newly discovered from artists or albums I’m not familiar with, and so on. So you’ll find that the selections over time have shifted from the old standbys, to the somewhat more
quirkyeclectic end of the spectrum. For my taste, this will eventually make each year’s list too uniformly unfamiliar… and whatever else might be true about the holiday, I value the familiar! - I’ve also developed a practice of trying to balance each year’s music among songs of different types. For instance, I’ve taken to juggling the more recent selections to include both old and new artists/performances; performances by men and women; instrumentals and vocals; “edgy” and/or energetic vs. quieter and/or contemplative renditions; shorter vs. longer songs; and so on. Mixing up the complete list via shuffle mode will distribute these properties much more evenly over time.
- Finally, I like the idea — even if just imagined — that you can visit RAMH, pop out the playlist, close your other browser windows, and just set the thing going via remote speakers or headphones while you pursue other holiday matters: hanging decorations, cooking, partying…
And now… on to the wool-gathering!