Too Early For Christmas Music and the Madness of Black Friday
When is it too early for Christmas music to played? Nothing signals the good will towards fellow man spirit of the holidays than the madness of Black Friday
When exactly is it too early for Christmas music? Should there be an agreed upon time frame of when we can expect to hear Jingle Bells fifty times everyday? Does it seem like stores and radio stations have been jumping the gun too early with the Christmas season?
This has been a trend that seems to get worse and worse with each passing year. Long before you’re devouring your turkey on Thanksgiving you can already hear the strains of Christmas tunes.
The day after Thanksgiving is meant to mark the start of the holiday shopping season. Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday – you’re constantly reminded that it’s time to get out and start buying gifts in preparation for the big Day on December 25th. The sounds of these Christmas carols really help to get people in the mood.
This year it seems the sounds of Christmas are particularly early. With a full week of November left it seems a bit premature for Joy to the World. I know retailers love the Christmas season for all the business they’ll do and are thrilled there’s going to be more shopping days available this year. It seems they go immediately from displaying Halloween ghosts and ghouls in their windows to jumping to angels and snowmen.
Radio stations probably enjoy the simple uncomplicated song selections Christmas allows. These stations that run Christmas music 24 hours – my local station started it this weekend – can’t be very hard to program. Just dig up the Christmas cd’s, let them play for the next month and every so often advertise some sale. I remember a few years ago a station started playing Christmas music in October!
Christmas movies are an easy programming decision. Every year they churn out more saccharine-soaked tales of the holiday. The Hallmark Channel has tons of them running already. They’re supposedly really popular with that particular niche Christmas audience who can’t get enough of them.
I will admit I’m oddly curious about The Christmas Consultant starring David Hasselhoff. It can’t possibly be a future holiday classic could it? I can’t remember the last good movie I saw Hasselhoff star in. I don’t think there was anything this century. Just the premise of this flick sounds like it will be a real joyous trainwreck with the Hoff front and center!
There’s such an overwhelming amount of Christmas stuff already I’ll start to get sick of it even before December hits! I understand that it’s supposed to be that festive time of year and all, but there can be too much of a good thing you know.
Let’s pace ourselves a bit and not be so anxious to start this all up so quickly. Does anyone even stop to enjoy Thanksgiving anymore? It seems nowadays that that Thursday has just become a day to grab a bite to eat in between watching Christmas parades and doing some shopping.
If I had to use one word to describe the holiday season it would be – “rushed”.
Every year December just seems to run on fast-forward to me. There’s a rush to start it all up, there’s a rush running around the whole time with the big deadline looming ahead. Then once December 25th is over, the decorations immediately get torn down, Christmas music ends and trees get tossed to the curb. I always found it puzzling some people literally throw their trees out the very next day. I suspect they must of been put up early November in peoples homes and have long ago died.
I noticed some radio stations actually stop playing Christmas carols on Christmas evening! What’s the rationale in that??? You can’t even listen to Christmas carols while planning your after-Christmas shopping. What an immediate way to end the season on!
It’s hard to even slow down and enjoy anything in December. I think the ones who get the most out of Christmas are really kids. From their point of view it can’t come fast enough. They count down the days and are just dying to see all the goodies Santa will bring them.
They’re lucky, they can just sit back and enjoy the season if they wanted. They’re not privy to all the behind the scenes drama. They don’t have to do all the running around, shopping, cooking. Of course telling a little kid to relax and just relish in the season is absurd – they want to get to the day when they get presents!
Black Friday has come to represent the start of the holiday season. Forget the big Macy’s Day parade – a holiday parade sponsored by a big store – and Santa pulling up the rear. Folks catch a quick glimpse of him and once that fat guy is out of eye-shot, they’ll start rifling through the store circulars and start planning all the shopping they’ll be doing during the long weekend.
A day of chaotic shopping truly signals the start of the most holiest of holiday seasons……does anyone else find this all amusing?
I find it extremely ironic that most of the news after Thanksgiving are reports about Black Friday and the mayhem by consumers who were ready to knock their fellow man down to save 40% off a television set. Running, screaming, punching, kicking – this is the real soundtrack to the start of the season, not Silent Night!
They all have to go shopping because it's the festive season, but everything turns into a disaster and becomes Black Friday, as Charlie Brown would said his catchprase 'Good Grief'.
In Los Angeles, we have a radio station that started playing Christmas music about 10 days ago. I'm not a "bah humbug" guy, but I told my wife and daughter in the car that I am refusing to listen to the station until Nov. 28th. And, I agree, it bothers me that the station will go right back to soft/pop rock on Dec. 26th. One of the joys I find in being Catholic is that while "Advent" (or preparation for Christmas) begins on Dec. 1st, the actual "Christmas Season" begins on Dec. 25th and goes on for two weeks afterwards.
I agree about the music starting before Thanksgiving. I won’t listen to it if it’s on even though I love Christmas music, but it just doesn’t feel right to hear it beforehand. That same thing with Thanksgiving. It’s like people forget that it’s happening since it’s overshadowed by Black Friday and the Christmas stuff.