Bing Crosby's recording of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" is the laziest piece of junk. I never noticed until this year. At least it was released as "I Wish You a Merry Christmas," thus relieving all arrangers, producers, and players from any culpability.
Here are the lyrics as most of us know them:
Holy shit! Jam with Joe friggin' Perry?? LIVE???
Ok, sorry. Here's Bing:
Yeah, double reeds! Let's break this down:
I wish you a merry Christmas.
I wish you a merry Christmas.
I wish you a merry Christmas,
And a Happy New Year.
That's fine. A little selfish. But ok. Time for the booze-soaked, dried fruit gut bomb:
UHHH bring us some figgy pudding.
Uhh bring us some figgy pudding.
Oh bring us some figgy pudding,
And bring it out here.
Sounds like Bing has been hitting the brandy. Maybe the cooking sherry. (Editor's note: I don't care how desperate you are--don't drink the cooking sherry. Trust me. And I have no idea if Bing Crosby was drunk for this. But if I had been in his place, I would have been pretty drunk.)
We won't go until we got some.
We won't go until we got some.
We won't go until we got some,
So bring some out here.
Where's my cup of good cheer? And aren't we missing a few "Good tidings..." and shit?
And I have to take issue with the original carol/song--it's like some sort of wassail, door-to-door hold up. WE WON'T GO UNTIL WE GOT SOME! AND WE'RE GONNA SING WITH WEIRD GRAMMAR, TOO! UNTIL YOU HAND OVER THE DAMNED FIGGY PUDDING!
Bing's performance ends with the Merry Christmas, Figgy Pudding, then another Merry Christmas verse. Except he substitutes "I" with "We." Sorry, folks. Bing has now included all y'all in this travesty.
He doesn't even do the "We won't go" bit. Maybe they got tired of singing traditional Christmas songs with verbs in the wrong tense. I would love to know how much time he spent on this tune at this session.
I wish you a Merry Christmas.
I wish you a Merry Christmas.
I wish you a Merry Christmas,
So bring some out here.
And I won't go until I got some.
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