The Abominable “O Holy Night” Redux
Blog, Featured, Humor, Music — By Jordan Green on December 3, 2009 at 3:22 pm
We have a Christmas tradition around these parts. Every year, shortly after Thanksgiving, we re-post Burnside’s most popular article of all time: “The Abominable ‘O Holy Night’”. Along with the Advent Conspiracy, this insanely awful little diddy gets us in the Christmas spirit.
Or, if you’d rather watch a cartoon of the song performed by zombies, there’s this spectacular entry from Eric Maziade.
The story of this horrendous rendition of the Christmas classic and Burnside is rather lengthy. Years ago, I came across the recording on The Sneeze, one of the greatest blogs in existence. I posted it on Burnside, ruminating on the track’s mysterious origins. It quickly became our most popular post, and always draws massive traffic around the Christmas season.
In November 2007, I was contacted by a gentleman who claimed to be the voice and mind behind the meme. He was kind enough to grant us an interview, and the mystery was solved.
In some ways, it was a little sad…sort of like finding out who Alanis Morrisette and Carly Simon were singing about on “You Oughta Know” and “You’re So Vain”, respectively1. There’s a charm to anonymity, you know? Knowing doesn’t make it any better.
But we are nothing if not intrepid reporters, so here’s the transcript of that interview.
- I’ve always assumed it was either Dave Coulier or Felix Potvin in the former, and James Taylor or Warren Beatty in the latter. ↩
8 Comments
I just feel off my chair and I think I broke a rib. A VISUAL!!! This song is the only holiday tradition I have and I partake it the tradition every time I have a bad day. The video…the tears, the sweat, the ridiculously tight pants on a zombie. Merry Christmas.
I love this comment. Thank you, J.Renee.
No, Jordan. Thank you. Thanks a million.
Maybe next year I will be able to get through the whole thing.
I’m 0-2.
this sounds a little like bob dylan’s new christmas c.d.
Okay, I did a re-make of this song and lip-synced to it a few years ago for our college ministry: http://is.gd/5gRC1 …I think it’s pretty funny.
At OF COURSE, I COULD BE WRONG… I have been posting a different awful Christmas song everyday since the beginning of the month (I have hundreds of these abominations in my collection). I make it more palatable for my readers by, in my capacity as a Church of England priest, offering them days off purgatory if they manage to get through them (the more painful the song, the more days off purgatory they get).
The most hated song, by far, is “Little Drummer Boy.” Yesterday I posted a 43 minute version of this classic. There were a few internal injuries reported but most of my readers are sensible enough to switch off before their brains start to boil.