Prompt: "A non-holiday song for your favorite holiday"
Selected by Joe
"Christmas at the 'Vous"
Steady Hands
Truth in Comedy, 2018
I don't mind that Christmas is usually reserved for family. It's not like I have so much fun with my extended family that I need to hang out with them as much as possible (no offense, Bob). It just makes things easier. I have a tough time making plans with people in general, and I shudder to think of the pressure one might feel to make FUN PLANS™ on Christmas Day, were it necessary. It's not necessary. We can just have the parents and in-laws and siblings and nieces/nephew over on Christmas afternoon, and that'll be that.
I count myself as fortunate that it's been like that my whole life. There were a spate of years at Uncle Jim's house, then Aunt Maggie's. There were a few years when I was working at the Laf all day, and at least one when I was on the phones from 7A-11A. The last thirteen years' worth of Christmases have been a delicate dance of which-house-are-we-going-to-first nonsense (until we wised up two years ago and just hosted the whole thing ourselves), but the point is that we had somewhere to go. It's never "are we doing anything on Christmas?" We have family in the area and it's easy to get together due to that close proximity and levels of tension that never boils above the peace/murder line.
But there's a whole different world just around the corner that I've never experienced, and that's spending Christmas at a bar. At first glance you might consider this "sad," but I disagree. I think there's so much value in chosen family, and even if a bar is half-filled with strangers, I think there would be a fast and easy camaraderie to be found at such a venue on that specific date. Drinking alone together, and all that. I imagine too that it's a healthy mix of people who have no family, people who choose not to be with family, and people who cannot be with their family for whatever reason. But what I would argue is that the magic of Christmas has to be strong at such a place on the day of.
There's something weird and magical and kinda surreal about doing anything pedestrian on Christmas. Back in the '90s, I'd hang out and play with my pals on the block almost every day, and that would happen on Christmas, but Christmas felt different somehow. Or, like, say you stop at Wawa for gas on Christmas Day—the strangers faces around you, whereas on any other day would be sullen or distracted, are today joyful, gracious, at peace. You can even find this unique space in a subsection of the family party; I'm remembering me and my cousins hanging out in the basement at an uncle's house, away for the grown-ups, a normal act that was transformed emotionally because you're performing that act on a nominally special day.
I'm really glad bars are open on Christmas, since they seem to provide a space that relieves the pressure of "being with loved ones" that you might feel on that day. I don't feel that pressure, and I don't think anyone should have to feel that pressure. Christmas is magical, and that magic exists everywhere on that day, even your McNally's-type spaces.
Not that this song is necessarily about that. The only indication we get that the song takes place on the high holiday is in the title (and, after listening to it, you'll understand that this has none of the hallmarks of your typical "Christmas song," musically speaking, and is thus eligible for today's prompt). I might even argue that "Christmas at the 'Vous" is more of a New Year's Eve song than a Christmas song. There's a lot of talk about how the past year was filled with good times and bad. The overarching point being that it's just easier to hide from everything at the bar.
I tried to research if the bar in question, Locust Rendezvous, was open on Christmas, but my work computer is blocking their website. If I had to guess, I'd say that they were. Seems exactly the type of bar that should be open on Christmas. It would be weird to go to the bar at a steak house or like Morgan's Pier or some shit on Christmas, but a dive bar? Hell yeah. Not sure if they sell buckets of beer like the song implies; maybe that's a Christmas Day thing that I'll never experience.
Not sure if I can pull together a general theme of this blog post today. Something about the magic of Christmas, right? Is that what I was going for? It's really tough to think about any of this on a hot muggy August day.
That's the thing about Christmas magic, though. It's so fleeting. What I felt when I was younger, back when I took my family for granted, that overpowering magic, even now it simmers at a lower temperature on the big day. It's still there—I just spend this entire blog post arguing that you can feel it everywhere, and I'm not backing down on that already—just at a slight remove. I'm now wondering about the age of the frontman of Steady Hands.
Sean Huber, erstwhile drummer of Modern Baseball (and lead vocals on that middle verse of MoBo's best song), was born in 1991, which would make him 27 years old when this song is released. It tracks that that would be a young enough age that you'd want to spend Christmas at Locust Rendezvous, if that option was available to you. And it also tracks that that's an old enough to not feel any good tidings or cheers specifically related to Christmas magic while you're at that bar on December 25th, at least not enough to mention it in song.
But ya know what? Dude sounds like he's living his best life. He's drinking beers with his buddy, he's toasting to a year well spent, and he's making a huge claim: "Like the Boss in reverse / We won't ever miss those glory days." Christmas might be a time when you do some looking back and reminiscing about the good times you had and the good people you spent it with, but Steady Hands say no, that's not how he's spending his Christmas, nor is it how he's spending his life. He's instead looking forward, knowing that the glory days are ahead. I admire that, and I think that's a great way to spend Christmas Day.
I count myself as fortunate that it's been like that my whole life. There were a spate of years at Uncle Jim's house, then Aunt Maggie's. There were a few years when I was working at the Laf all day, and at least one when I was on the phones from 7A-11A. The last thirteen years' worth of Christmases have been a delicate dance of which-house-are-we-going-to-first nonsense (until we wised up two years ago and just hosted the whole thing ourselves), but the point is that we had somewhere to go. It's never "are we doing anything on Christmas?" We have family in the area and it's easy to get together due to that close proximity and levels of tension that never boils above the peace/murder line.
But there's a whole different world just around the corner that I've never experienced, and that's spending Christmas at a bar. At first glance you might consider this "sad," but I disagree. I think there's so much value in chosen family, and even if a bar is half-filled with strangers, I think there would be a fast and easy camaraderie to be found at such a venue on that specific date. Drinking alone together, and all that. I imagine too that it's a healthy mix of people who have no family, people who choose not to be with family, and people who cannot be with their family for whatever reason. But what I would argue is that the magic of Christmas has to be strong at such a place on the day of.
There's something weird and magical and kinda surreal about doing anything pedestrian on Christmas. Back in the '90s, I'd hang out and play with my pals on the block almost every day, and that would happen on Christmas, but Christmas felt different somehow. Or, like, say you stop at Wawa for gas on Christmas Day—the strangers faces around you, whereas on any other day would be sullen or distracted, are today joyful, gracious, at peace. You can even find this unique space in a subsection of the family party; I'm remembering me and my cousins hanging out in the basement at an uncle's house, away for the grown-ups, a normal act that was transformed emotionally because you're performing that act on a nominally special day.
I'm really glad bars are open on Christmas, since they seem to provide a space that relieves the pressure of "being with loved ones" that you might feel on that day. I don't feel that pressure, and I don't think anyone should have to feel that pressure. Christmas is magical, and that magic exists everywhere on that day, even your McNally's-type spaces.
Not that this song is necessarily about that. The only indication we get that the song takes place on the high holiday is in the title (and, after listening to it, you'll understand that this has none of the hallmarks of your typical "Christmas song," musically speaking, and is thus eligible for today's prompt). I might even argue that "Christmas at the 'Vous" is more of a New Year's Eve song than a Christmas song. There's a lot of talk about how the past year was filled with good times and bad. The overarching point being that it's just easier to hide from everything at the bar.
I tried to research if the bar in question, Locust Rendezvous, was open on Christmas, but my work computer is blocking their website. If I had to guess, I'd say that they were. Seems exactly the type of bar that should be open on Christmas. It would be weird to go to the bar at a steak house or like Morgan's Pier or some shit on Christmas, but a dive bar? Hell yeah. Not sure if they sell buckets of beer like the song implies; maybe that's a Christmas Day thing that I'll never experience.
Not sure if I can pull together a general theme of this blog post today. Something about the magic of Christmas, right? Is that what I was going for? It's really tough to think about any of this on a hot muggy August day.
That's the thing about Christmas magic, though. It's so fleeting. What I felt when I was younger, back when I took my family for granted, that overpowering magic, even now it simmers at a lower temperature on the big day. It's still there—I just spend this entire blog post arguing that you can feel it everywhere, and I'm not backing down on that already—just at a slight remove. I'm now wondering about the age of the frontman of Steady Hands.
Sean Huber, erstwhile drummer of Modern Baseball (and lead vocals on that middle verse of MoBo's best song), was born in 1991, which would make him 27 years old when this song is released. It tracks that that would be a young enough age that you'd want to spend Christmas at Locust Rendezvous, if that option was available to you. And it also tracks that that's an old enough to not feel any good tidings or cheers specifically related to Christmas magic while you're at that bar on December 25th, at least not enough to mention it in song.
But ya know what? Dude sounds like he's living his best life. He's drinking beers with his buddy, he's toasting to a year well spent, and he's making a huge claim: "Like the Boss in reverse / We won't ever miss those glory days." Christmas might be a time when you do some looking back and reminiscing about the good times you had and the good people you spent it with, but Steady Hands say no, that's not how he's spending his Christmas, nor is it how he's spending his life. He's instead looking forward, knowing that the glory days are ahead. I admire that, and I think that's a great way to spend Christmas Day.
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