S02E104 - CHRISTMAS HITS
Episode Stats
Summary
It's the season of giving, and we're here to talk about it. We're talking about the birth of Christ, and what it means to be a christian in the 21st century, and why you should stop being a Christian if you don't celebrate Christmas.
Transcript
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When I was five minutes, no one knew it was bad.
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When I would hang up my stocking at Christmas, open my presents and I'd be back.
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Welcome to our Super Duper Christmas app, folks.
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Because every day is Christmas, really, on this show.
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This is what I always say about people who use letters they don't use letters, use words they don't understand.
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I've noticed now that using the number sign after the number is just a given.
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It's like the word literally no longer means literally.
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Eventually, when people make the same mistake enough times, it ceases to be a mistake.
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A Japanese man had a one-night stand with a random Puerto Rican hairdresser.
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And I'll never not be a mistake, judging by your logic.
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No, my mom wanted to abort me, but then my aunt, who was like kind of, she's kind of a salty aunt to me.
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As I was growing up, she was kind of salty towards me.
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First, she makes you live, and then she treats you like shit.
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No, no, my mom treated me great, but my, yeah, my aunt.
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My aunt said, you know, you should have the kid because it'll be Asian.
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It sure looks like they don't when you walk through the Bronx.
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And we'd like to dedicate this particular episode to the birth of Christ.
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The pagans had a silly, stupid religion where they worshiped the sun and threw babies into fires because the matriarchy is far more cruel than the patriarchy could ever be.
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And we said, you know what, we're going to do it just like Halloween.
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We're going to take your shitty holiday and we're going to push Jesus' birth up till December 25th.
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Actually, you don't even have to worship Christ.
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My daughter knows a girl that's so religious, she doesn't celebrate Halloween.
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But Halloween has been subsumed by Christianity, and it's the All Saints Day is the next day.
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So it was Sam Hain, the pagan thing, and then we made it ours.
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And this is why I always stress at this time of year, Jews should celebrate Christmas.
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I think here they call it like a chrism or something?
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No, here in New York, they call it like a chishm or a chrism or a chrism.
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So don't interject if you don't know the answer.
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Okay, well, you folks at home can play that back.
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I know you're getting kind of sick of these letters.
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They turn off automatically, and I have a remote for them.
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It's also weird that I have the Scottish Tam on because the Scots aren't big fans of Christmas.
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So whatever the English do, the Scots do the opposite.
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If English people drink Coca-Cola, they drink Pepsi.
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They notice that the English are more Christian and tend to celebrate Christmas with more enthusiasm.
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We're going to pretend this isn't pre-taped and we have to get back to our families.
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So I want to spend this episode going over my favorite Christmas jams.
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Maybe some of you are cops who have to work this shift.
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So I'm going to share with you my favorite Christmas songs.
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The Bonnie, which I guarantee you'll spell wrong.
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This is about a bonfire, but Bonnie also means pretty in Scotland.
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Some of these are going to leak into New Year's Eve.
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Just a tiny bit, but it's amazing how many good Christmas jams there are.
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Thank you to the reader who introduced us to him.
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Should we write all these down as we're doing them?
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That sounds like it's gonna not look good though.
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God, I look so much like my dad with this hat on.
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It's a horror movie from when I was a kid, and this guy becomes invisible, rapes a woman.
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He turns into a hideous monster, but they save money by making him invisible.
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And then he rapes a woman, she gets pregnant, has a normal kid, but like you, turns into a piece of shit at 18.
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And then becomes invisible and goes and rapes someone and so on and so on and so on.
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This is, I always joke about this movie with my dad because this is how I feel.
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Like we did not get along when I was a teenager.
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And then in my 20s, you know, I started realizing that he wasn't as stupid as I thought he was.
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As Mark Twain says, it's amazing what my father learned from when I was the age of 16 to 24.
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And now I look down and like I start using, like if I get scared, I go, oh, Jesus Christ.
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I didn't know my dad existed from the ages of 16 and 24 until the ages of...
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Is it because you came to my house and saw my wonderful family and you had dinner with us and it was roast chicken and you saw like the normal family and you thought, I want one of those.
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Well, yeah, I always do want a family, but yeah, I feel a little farther away from that becoming a reality than ever, really.
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And I just lean back and I just go, nothing fucking matters.
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I said that you said aloud, nothing really matters, and you were depressed.
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But you pointed out that you were alone in a bar and repeated the line from the song, nothing really matters.
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I don't know about forevs, but I would hope that they would.
00:10:43.000
Like, I'll always say two and two is four, and you'll turn into fucking Terrence Howard.
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Like, two and two is really just one plus one plus one plus one.
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Because you're right, but you're making it seem way worse.
00:11:04.000
The amount of work that I had to do, and I was a little overwhelmed by that.
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But they don't, by the time they see this, it'll be done.
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Anyway, the other intern stone we have is I said I want Jews to celebrate Christmas.
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Now, I don't mean the nativity scene, but the Jews I know in California do the presents, do the tree, do the 25th, and have the Santa.
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It's based on German culture and Nordic gods, God of Thunder.
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It's got a whole other trajectory that is so distant from Christianity and Judaism that it's not an issue.
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You don't want a little Jesus in your house if you're Jewish.
00:12:17.000
And he was wearing a shirt that had black Bart Simpson on it.
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Anyway, Tanner's on the subway on the L-train, and these two black kids come up to me and go, yo, what the fuck?
00:13:03.000
So let's go back a step now to that other jam, Father Christmas by the Kinks.
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It's really the drum rolls that make this song.
00:14:11.000
So usually greatest hits things start with the worst and go and get better and better.
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But we just started with the greatest Christmas song of all time.
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No, I think it's called Merry Christmas, but it might be called Christmas rapping.
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All bands want to have a Christmas song because once you can knock that out of the park, it's literally the gift that keeps on giving.
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Bah humbug, but that's too strong Cause it is my favorite holiday But all this year's been a busy blur Don't think I have the energy To ride in my already mad rush Just cause it's Christmas season The perfect gift for me Would be complete since then The bass player's not even trying to pretend to play the bass line.
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Don't people from Ohio or like Wisconsin feel Canadian in some way?
00:16:03.000
Hailed a picture, frozen landscape Chilled this room for 24 days Evergreen, sparkling snow Yeah, Akron, Ohio.
00:16:28.000
So we finished the Irishman last night, and it was a homework assignment.
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I mean, my wife and I both went downstairs and just went, ah, here we go.
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I don't know what it is, a Mediterranean in them.
00:16:49.000
He goes, Irishmen is superior to goodfellas in that goodfellas cut out all the driving and checking into hotels and just left the exciting parts.
00:16:59.000
And I text that to my wife because after we watched the Irishman, which at the end I was just repeating in a mantra, shoot him, shoot him.
00:17:08.000
Like you want De Niro to die so bad so the movie will be over.
00:17:13.000
And then I put on Mean Streets after the movie was over and looked at what his face looked like when he was a young man.
00:17:21.000
He had a big pelican nose that took up 80% of his face, but he looks nothing.
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Robert De Niro and the Irishman, when they have him young, looks not one iota like that.
00:17:39.000
He's a little tiny midget drama club kid with a gay poet dad who loved to dance and do art.
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And because he lived near Mulberry Street with Scorsese, he saw these tough Goombas and he was a good little queer who knew how to act like them.
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And then, and this happens a lot in New York, then he kind of became the guy.
00:18:03.000
This has happened numerous times in history where people who aren't that guy play that guy and then that guy takes them over.
00:18:13.000
The movie How to Get a Head in Advertising, starring Richard E. Grant, the same guys who did with Nail and I, do a movie about this sales dude who develops a tumor on his shoulder and the tumor gets bigger and bigger and then it starts talking to him.
00:18:27.000
And then it gets so big that when he goes to amputate it, they accidentally amputate the wrong tumor.
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They amputate his head and the tumor takes over.
00:18:39.000
Well, I was looking up something else, but what is that?
00:18:57.000
By the way, Richard E. Grant got nothing for Withnail and I, nothing for this masterpiece.
00:19:01.000
Then he acts like a homo in some movie about fake letters starring Tubby McGee, Melissa McCarthy.
00:19:13.000
My name is Barbara Simmons, and I'm a biochemist.
00:19:20.000
Rule number one, be creative in every situation.
00:19:34.000
Compared to this, Dandruff was a birthday present.
00:19:48.000
You'll soon run down and you become a ball yourself.
00:20:03.000
It's very similar to Whipmill and I. Just pause.
00:20:13.000
So the tumor that is developed ends up being similar to Satan.
00:20:18.000
And they have a scene where the wife is talking to her friends.
00:20:21.000
And she's talking about how weird he's become since the operation because he's the tumor.
00:20:29.000
The other day he said he wished I had nipples on my ass.
00:20:36.000
Anyway, so that concept of the character you have taking over your personality and becoming you happened to, who the hell was I talking about?
00:21:05.000
I see you as the Fae Drama Club kid all over New York.
00:21:13.000
And when these kids are Ryan's height and below, they aren't invited to play sports.
00:21:23.000
De Niro, who's, I think, 5'4 ⁇ , is staring down at Joe Pesci.
00:21:33.000
Anyway, at least Joe Pesci, I don't get the feeling that he was a little drama club pussy who decided to become a tough guy.
00:21:40.000
I think he has a wise guy background to some extent.
00:21:49.000
I saw that picture a long time ago, and now I realize, oh, they were making the Irishman.
00:21:58.000
The other funny thing about that movie, too, and you see that in the last picture, De Niro is like 80 years old.
00:22:12.000
You see with Ben Stiller's dad, Jerry Stiller on King of Queens?
00:22:17.000
So they have De Niro when he's 30 beating up a guy, but he's got his little Jerry Stiller arms, and it looks so gimpy.
00:22:35.000
I know David Cross's cousin Aviva went to high school with him and it was an art school where you danced and you did lots of arty stuff and had improv.
00:22:46.000
And he was doing all that and mostly focusing on dance.
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And they go, what about that really effeminate dancing guy?
00:23:30.000
I can't find one picture where his eyes aren't fruity eyes.
00:23:34.000
I'm not saying he's literally a homosexual, but he's a fruity dude.
00:23:48.000
When he was a little kid doing kids, he had his backpack and he's like, hey guys, what's going on?
00:23:52.000
Now he's doing movies with Matthew McConaughey.
00:23:55.000
He's still like, hey, we did a weird surf movie, man.
00:23:58.000
Like, he's still the Jew nerd that he's always been, and that's sincere.
00:24:04.000
But Lou Reed, exactly the same guy as Harmony Corinne, nerdy, insecure.
00:24:09.000
He comes to New York and he's overwhelmed by the coolness.
00:24:13.000
So he starts doing heroin and then he starts wearing sunglasses at night.
00:24:17.000
Is there anything more insecure than always wearing sunglasses?
00:24:26.000
The smack starts giving him this, I don't give a shit, personality, man.
00:24:35.000
I'm kind of a badass, fucking lazy dude who's totally unflappable and I'm kind of sexual too.
00:24:44.000
Like, when I see that picture, I see a nervous Jewish kid.
00:24:49.000
Actually, if you go up to that high school photo, you can see who he really is.
00:24:56.000
I want to come to New York, but everyone is so tough down.
00:24:58.000
They're wearing leather jackets and they're doing the punk thing with the Avon Garde.
00:25:06.000
They just give him basically a bio instead of it.
00:25:08.000
Tall, dark-haired Lou likes basketball, music, and naturally.
00:25:31.000
He's like, Zen, like, well, man, you know, you do an acting role, man.
00:25:35.000
So he became, that's how he acts, like, in, uh, Yeah, okay, I'll give you that.
00:25:56.000
When I talk about Lou Reed and Tupac Shakir and Robert De Niro, I have background.
00:26:06.000
Are you saying people act like someone in their movies?
00:26:08.000
But he doesn't really act like that, like, okay, okay, okay, guy.
00:26:12.000
Well, going back to what you said in the other show, I think he's more just self-indulgent, which comes off like.
00:26:18.000
No wonder Ryan's mailbag is the biggest flop in the history of free speech TV.
00:26:51.000
A lot of these I'm putting on the list because you want to entertain your friends, but that's not the purpose of this show.
00:26:56.000
This show is to turn you on to Christmas classics that you haven't heard of before.
00:27:00.000
What about what Christmas Means to Me by Stevie Wonder?
00:27:59.000
Like, I have this album of him when he was 12, and it's almost punk rock.
00:28:16.000
So wait, what am I supposed to type in besides?
00:28:22.000
No, when you have Wonder next to Stevie Wonder, it's going to be too much.
00:28:24.000
The album has Boy Wonder, but put Stevie Wonder 12 years old.
00:28:36.000
I find the link, and then I email you the 12-year-old genius.
00:28:43.000
Boy Wonder would have been a good title for it.
00:28:48.000
Well, he had plenty of albums when he was that young.
00:28:59.000
Ladies and gentlemen, now I'm going to do a song, Okay, close that.
00:30:44.000
And like Merry Christmas Babies, a good crowd pleaser.
00:30:46.000
You got your boring relatives at the house, so you play them some hits, right?
00:30:51.000
Tom Petting the Heartbreakers, Christmas All Over Again.
00:31:22.000
I wonder what percentage of the Ramones royalty income comes from classics like this.
00:31:36.000
Wow, since when did you learn to write don't start with something don't stop this is every video in the 80s some jerk trying to bring you down my friend yes you're friends you're right you're right you're right because I don't know how to make friends why aren't they at their folks house if they don't have kids this is Howard Stern at his peak See
00:32:40.000
Okay, speaking of Otis Redding, I mean, speaking of Stevie Wonder, the next one to put with that is Otis Redding.
00:33:14.000
You may have remembered this from a couple weeks ago.
00:33:49.000
We met this carpet dude in Denmark who designed artisanal carpets, mid-century carpets, which is, you know, gay central.
00:34:00.000
And he had all this evidence that, yeah, he was Otis Redding's lover.
00:34:03.000
I think Otis Redding moved to Europe actually to be with him.
00:34:12.000
Okay, I think the only rap song that is good for Christmas is Christmas and Hollis.
00:34:21.000
What did you think about Hollis Queens when you were a kid growing up?
00:34:45.000
If I lived in Japan, I wouldn't try to Japanese holidays.
00:35:32.000
B. Davidson, like, putting the kids on the naughty list.
00:35:57.000
I picked the wallet up and then I took the board.
00:36:12.000
A boat like that you just showed, that's going to run you maybe 200 grand.
00:36:32.000
Look, it's an unwritten rule, and I'm fine with this.
00:36:34.000
In fact, I have a card in my wallet that says, if found, take all the money, and I will give you an additional $200.
00:36:48.000
Find any card, put it in a very noticeable spot in your wallet, like maybe above your driver's license, there's a card there that just says read this.
00:37:02.000
I don't care if there's a thousand bucks in there, dude.
00:37:04.000
Take all the money, and I will give you an additional $200.
00:37:11.000
Believe me, it's more than $200 worth of time to get your social security number back, your driver's license, all those credit cards, all that shit.
00:37:27.000
What about if we were to merge atoms and destroy them in order to, you know, create this sort of massive energy?
00:37:36.000
And the energy would equal the mass that we destroyed times the speed of light squared.
00:38:11.000
Once a year, my friend puts on a red suit and hangs around with me in my pie.
00:38:18.000
Now I can't help but feeling jealous each time she climbs on his knee and she stands beneath the mistletoe screaming for him to stand beneath the mist.
00:38:31.000
Okay, here's a good band that I discovered while making this list, this Christmas list for you.
00:38:38.000
And I've never really heard much about them before or since.
00:38:46.000
And the super awesome jam I'm talking about is called It's Christmas, so we'll stop.
00:39:17.000
As the rod stops for today, let the rod stop just for the day.
00:39:31.000
You can tell how troubled he is just by his voice.
00:39:36.000
And Hutchinson was reported missing by Scottish police and the members of Frightened Rabbit on 9th of May 2018.
00:40:04.000
Oh, didn't you live by that standard and it absolutely kills me?
00:40:14.000
And then the Chief Inspector of Police of Scotland reported they were searching for the area around Forth Road Bridge in Hutchinson and were trying to contact two individuals.
00:40:22.000
Police discovered a body at 8.30 p.m. in the Port Edgar region near South Queens Ferry.
00:40:28.000
It was confirmed that it was that of Hutchison.
00:40:36.000
There are no words to describe the overwhelming sadness and pain that comes with the death of our beloved Scott.
00:40:41.000
This is a good day, by the way, to get together with people that you care about.
00:40:45.000
And if you know of someone who's alone today, give them a call.
00:40:54.000
It's Christmas Day, but we still got plenty of oohers to go and say hello to people.
00:41:03.000
I'm doing a funny accent to hide the fact that if I get too sincere here, I will cry.
00:41:10.000
I like the fact that I could just not speak sometimes.
00:41:15.000
No, but like, remember that girl at our house last year?
00:41:32.000
But to know he is no longer suffering brings us comfort.
00:41:34.000
Reading messages of support and hope from those he has helped, blah, blah, blah.
00:41:39.000
And then his last, last, last tweet was, I'm away now.
00:41:52.000
I mean, but if you're not found drowned, it's a suicide heroin then.
00:42:01.000
Or maybe suicide by heroin, but suicide nonetheless.
00:42:15.000
Anyway, let's get back to that song now that we've added a really depressing layer to it.
00:42:28.000
We can be best friends with the people we hate.
00:42:42.000
We all breathe like you better to give the least speech.
00:42:49.000
Not better than ever again So life might never get better than that It's a perfect excuse for our nature's to change and wear shiny clothes Oh, it's Christmas so it's all for you Look, I made myself cry.
00:43:31.000
Because I thought of people playing this song at Christmas on my recommendation.
00:43:36.000
And then two brothers who were fighting about Trump or something, something political.
00:43:46.000
And it was looking like they were never going to get over it.
00:43:48.000
And then one of them just puts his arm around the other's shoulders.
00:43:53.000
And they say, and that, they don't say anything, but that just says our relationship is more important than anything else.
00:44:07.000
You hug on to the day for the last few seconds you pray.
00:44:26.000
No, the band is Withered Hand and the song is Wonderful Lie.
00:44:31.000
They say we used to know someone who used to know someone who used to say we're in love.
00:44:50.000
I came to your house with big holes in my trousers.
00:44:55.000
We'd sit on your bed when your father allowed us to speak and you spoke to me.
00:45:03.000
But my physiognomy, you gave me away every time.
00:45:42.000
So this is just more like ambiance you have while you're doing the dishes.
00:45:58.000
You're not going to play run DMC Hollis Queens after all these tear jerkers.
00:46:14.000
The Decemberists, please, daddy, don't get drunk at Christmas.
00:46:21.000
Don't you think there should be a thing where you can just email a playlist to someone from Spotify?
00:46:29.000
I know, but I think you have to be part of my club.
00:46:39.000
Because now it's saying like find friends and stuff.
00:46:42.000
You could screenshot it, and then there's an app that turns anything into a PDF.
00:46:50.000
See what your friends are playing, find friends.
00:46:57.000
If you want, I'll transcribe it and send it out.
00:47:01.000
So you got the Decembrist play, Please Daddy Don't Get Drunk?
00:47:04.000
Mama stays, As you can see, You came in, caught up.
00:47:14.000
Okay, let's do one more sad one, and then we will get fun again.
00:47:36.000
Music I'm going to hear it for this one, but he's not related to Cat Stevens, is he?
00:47:53.000
Sometimes you'll be able to tell that when someone doesn't answer you, I think I got it.
00:48:07.000
Taking our shoes, riding a sled down the hillside, hillside.
00:48:29.000
There was a British punk band, kind of an oi band, called the Boys.
00:48:35.000
And they would record Christmas songs as the Yobbs.
00:48:42.000
I don't know what the acronym stands for, but it's...
00:48:53.000
Here we have a youth, a British slang hooligan lout.
00:49:18.000
that's why the boys, the band, the boys would call themselves the Yabs for Christmas.
00:49:31.000
sucks so far This wouldn't be on my list if it wasn't good.
00:49:53.000
Uh, there's the whole album, so maybe this isn't the one that rules that is that link the whole album.
00:50:00.000
Um, the song is C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S like separated with dashes.
00:50:12.000
C is for your little clit when I go down beneath.
00:50:24.000
H is for your cubic head that stick between my teeth.
00:50:36.000
Let's try the Vandals Hang Myself from the Tree.
00:50:59.000
Are you sure you're not playing the goddamn album again and not the goddamn song?
00:51:44.000
I remember the Vandals being a much more raucous band.
00:51:47.000
Yeah, they toned it down for little Christmas songs.
00:51:53.000
And last fun one, It's a Wonderful Life by Fishbone.
00:52:38.000
You know, I saw them once and they said, This is a huge celebration.
00:52:45.000
And they kind of got in a bit of trouble for that, but it was just the straight pride parade.
00:52:53.000
All right, let's end this with a hit by the band called Fear.
00:53:28.000
All the children of the street hope they get so gay.
00:53:42.000
Fuck business, fuck business, fuck business, fuck business, fuck business, fuck business, fuck business, fuck business.
00:53:53.000
Let's pull up fear on Saturday Night Live where John Belushi had been to CBGB's in Max's Kansas City and said, I love this new thing everyone's talking about called punk.
00:54:03.000
And so he said to Lauren Michaels, hey man, can we get some punk rockers on the show?
00:54:15.000
They're from L.A. And they have a great song about how New York sucks.
00:54:20.000
New York's all right if you like rats in the subway.
00:54:28.000
And so John Joseph of the Cro-Mags was just a young teenager at the time.
00:54:35.000
And they said, bring all your punk friends and do this moshing thing that you talk about.
00:54:50.000
And John Joseph said, careful what you wish for, dude.
00:54:58.000
They were running down the fire escapes, escaping from cops.
00:55:02.000
It was, sounds like one of the funnest nights in history.
00:55:04.000
And I'll tell you what, if I get a time machine, I know I'm supposed to kill Hitler, but I think I'd rather go to this.
00:55:12.000
That I'd rather be at the funnest concert ever than murdering babies?
00:55:19.000
They look very frightening, but they're really very nice.
00:55:24.000
And by the way, tonight, look out for surprises.
00:56:26.000
Right there, they're making fun of us for having saxophones in all our songs.
00:56:29.000
Is that why it was like doo-wopping in the front?
00:56:47.000
We cried thinking about you and your family, particularly your relationship with your brother.
00:56:54.000
I don't know why that was so emotional, but when we're listening to a man who killed himself after making a bunch of sad songs, we think either Scotland really sucks or you're a troubled individual that is indicative of the huge suicide problem we have in this country, especially among middle-aged white men like me, dads.
00:57:24.000
I'm going to somehow manage to get the whole list on this site.
00:57:26.000
I'm not sure how I'm going to do that without transcribing everything.
00:57:28.000
A little disappointed in Spotify for not making it easier.