Keeping One Step Ahead Of The Kris Kringle Within.
Bob Dylan’s Christmas In The Heart has been out for nearly a month now and I’ve successfully avoided it for the most part, strictly adhering to my no-Christmas-music-before-the-Thanksgiving-dishes-are-dry policy.
But now comes the release of Dylan’s absolutely bonkers video for Must Be Santa. It is joyful, festive, and completely bizarre. Further analysis is needed, but my initial thoughts are that it feels like some sort of Mad Men office party gone wrong (minus the John Deere mower and a mangled foot). Odds are, it’s the first Christmas-themed music video to end with a man jumping through a window (there’s one at every party though, isn’t there?). Finally, for some odd reason, I keep expecting Shane MacGowan to show up at some point (must be the combination of madness and accordion). Maybe he should have been cast as Santa.
Needless to say, I love it.
A personal anecdote: Though well-versed since babyhood in holiday classics, I had never heard Must Be Santa until my first grade teacher made the class sing it. Because we 6-year-olds had an underdeveloped sense of melody, harmony and diction, I had an awful time trying to figure out the words to the chorus (are they singing “musty Santa”? Or maybe “frosty Santa”?).
Bonus: Dylan performing a punky new wave power-pop version of Jokerman on Letterman, circa 1984. Chicano punk band The Plugz are backing him.
