About X/Z Song Trader: Steve is a music journalist, author and musician. Lucy is a diehard music fan and college student. They have always enjoyed a father/daughter bond over music. Each week one of them picks a song and they both share their perspectives. These are casual conversations based on musical connections. Opinions are their own. Keeping it positive.
Check out the whole X/Z Song Trader series.
Steve’s Perspective
The holidays have always been a strange mix of absolute joy and undefinable sadness for me.
I love December…and not just for the presents. I love the parties, dinners, candy, ridiculous decorations, the tree, the stockings, and even (most) of the holiday songs that start playing on repeat sometime in mid-July these days. I love Elf, The Grinch That Stole Christmas, various versions of A Christmas Carol, and, of course, It’s A Wonderful Life. I’ve even come to appreciate the uncanny creepiness of Polar Express. (And the presents.)
At the same time, a low level despair always creeps in around this time of year. I know there are good reasons why it happens—reduced sunlight leads to drops in serotonin, etc.—but my sadness demands poetry, not science. That’s why I’ve long relied on music to either ease the winter doldrums or steep in them like a hot tub at a ski resort.
Raucous holiday tracks such as “Fairytale of New York” by The Pogues or “Father Christmas” by The Kinks never fail to turn my mood around, while “Jesus Christ” by Big Star or “2000 Miles” by The Pretenders help me indulge in the seasonal sorrow.
This Teenage Fanclub song allows me to do both at the same time.
I’m not sure how they did it, but the opening guitar line is the exact sound and feeling of my annual malaise.
It’s the best Big Star riff that wasn’t written by Chris Bell or Alex Chilton, and the bass line is incredible. Then Gerard Love’s pensive vocals arrive followed by the strings and backing vocals, building intensity before the drums finally bash in a minute later.
There is no clear narrative as far as I can tell (Is it about a break up? Unrequited love? An oblique reference to “September Gurls?”), but the handful of lines capture the coldness, the bleakness, the assassin-inducing sadness that often arrives with winter.
It’s all so emotionally evocative that the final lines make perfect sense in my heart, while my rational mind is left wrestling with more questions than answers:
I’ve had this plan for many years but now I can’t remember.
I wanted to assassinate December
I wanted to assassinate December
The band takes over from there. The false endings never fail to stun. It’s perfect.
I’m honestly not sure what to expect this Christmas.
It will be the first time we aren’t celebrating at our house in Altadena since you were little. And the whole month is already starting to feel like a long reminder of the life we had just before the Eaton Fire destroyed our community and upended our lives.
I know we’ll all get through it together, and I’m hopeful that we’ll be in a better place this time next year. Until then, I guess I’ll just have to lean on songs like “December” a little harder this holiday season.
I want to hear how you’re doing with all of this. Are there certain holiday songs that you can rely to match or escape your mood? Are you still looking forward to the holidays?
Remind the algorithm that RTL exists!
Lucy’s Perspective
It’s funny because I don’t think I ever experienced true seasonal depression until I got to college.
The month of December always felt slow and melodic, but not inherently sad. That is what I loved most when I listened to this song for the first time. It is beautiful and sweet, but has undertones of something more. Something that does feel sad.
That is exactly the feeling that I now get every year around this time.
This year is especially tough, a lot has changed.
I work until after the sun sets most nights, I’m coming back to LA over break later than usual, and when I do come back I won’t be going to the same home where I’ve always celebrated Christmas. It has been a big year of change for us, and if nothing else I am grateful to know that coming home just to be with you guys for the holidays does feel like enough.
I have been listening to a lot of music lately. Most of it isn’t the kind of holiday music we play at work all day, but I do love “Merry Christmas, Please Don’t Call” by Bleachers and “When We Are Together” by The 1975.
Both of those songs feel melancholic and slow but still capture the chill mood of December.
Although I was definitely bummed to miss out on decorating the tree with you guys this year, my roommates and I got to put up some silly battery-operated lights and buy pine scented candles from Trader Joe’s. We have watched some Christmas movies and tried our best to make it feel like the holidays while we are still off at college.
I am really looking forward to getting to live out the rest of our holiday traditions: the annual tree-trimming party; the yearly holiday singalong; Christmas Eve dinner with close family friends…and Christmas morning when we’re all together!
Some winners in here - and Mazzy Star is like the melancholy bow on top. Tho, to me, there is no winter without Bon Iver.
Just as a non-holiday tangent, I have to admit that my enjoyment of Teenage Fanclub really waned once Gerry left the band. Norman and Raymond are fine songwriters as well, but there was something about Gerry’s voice, melancholy perspective and low-key hooks that really brought out the best in TFC.