Gregory, the Yuletide Crab Louse

All dressed up, and nowhere to go

Write a Christmas hit and you’ll never have to work again. Just follow these tried-and-tested steps:

Sort your festive sounds
You must have at least one of the following clichés: sleigh bells, handbells, French horn or other brass instrument, crunching snow, choir, children’s choir, singing animals, eg. frogs. These are more important than whether the song is in any way listenable.

Write a fucking annoying tune
Bash away at a Casio keyboard until you’ve got a sing-song tune that you both hate and haunts you. If it combines the worst elements of Paul McCartney’s Wonderful Christmastime and the Nokia ringtone, you’re onto a winner.

Choose your genre
Pick one of the following:

• Party song – the lyrics should be total nonsense, eg. ‘Santa’s knockin’, Grandma’s bobbing, Rudolf’s drinking nog from egg’. Suggested title Rockin’ Around the Robin.
• Totally mundane festive activity song – like Chris Rea’s Driving Home for Christmas, write a song that’s relatable because everyone fucking does it, eg. ‘Lighting the oven, yes we’re lighting the oven’. Suggested title We’re Lighting the Oven.
• Love song – can be sickeningly upbeat or wistful bollocks about an ill-fated romance, eg ‘Tears on my chocolates, tears in the snow/My heart is cold this Christmas time, why did you have to go?’ Suggested title You’re My Pig in a Blanket (upbeat) or I’m Crying at the Christmas Lights Switch-On (featuring Peter Andre) (sad).
• No more war song – should not offer constructive ways of resolving conflict, just vague sentimentality eg ‘No presents round the tree in the middle of this war/The little orphan girl looks so sad and says ‘What’s it all for?’ Suggested title Let’s Wish for Peace this Christmas.
• Novelty song – any straining Christmas cash-in that might prove implausibly popular, eg ‘The night before Christmas, and all through the house, nothing was stirring except Gregory, the Yuletide crab louse’. Suggested title Gregory, the Yuletide Crab Louse.

Record your masterpiece
Hire a studio and some jaded session musicians. Release it and make a fortune. In years to come the royalties will probably pay for a yacht, which is where you’ll become a seasonal recluse because it’s the only place to avoid hearing your own fucking song.

The Daily Mash

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