New jangle in 'Jingle Bells'
Stores getting wry with holiday music
Step inside Spencer Gifts and you won't hear Bing Crosby singing ''White Christmas" or Mel Torme crooning about chestnuts roasting over an open fire. Instead, the soundtrack features a Santa with a digestive problem and Osama bin Laden getting run over by a reindeer.
Stick around long enough and you might catch a reggae tune with the lyrics, ''I don't know what the white man say, Santa Claus is a black man anyway."
Welcome to Christmas 2005, a land where Sinatra's sincere shtick has yielded to ''South Park" satire.
''We started playing it the day after Halloween," said Lesley Correia, 21, manager of the Burlington Mall branch of Spencer Gifts, which targets adolescent and college-age customers. ''People love it. They always ask where they can buy the mix."
At the nearby Pottery Barn, which goes after 34- to 50-year-old customers, the classics still hold sway. But in
The irreverent trend is being fed by a fracturing listening base and a backlash against the ever-longer Christmas season, analysts say. And in stores aimed at Generation Y, another phenomenon is afoot: an allergy to manipulation.
''If you're dealing with younger consumers and something smells phony or contrived, they're going to walk away," said Jeff Daniel, founder of River Rock Productions in San Francisco, which creates varied music playlists for several national chains.
''There has to be a wink-wink -- an acknowledgment that we aren't taking ourselves too seriously, that we're in on the joke."
Audio marketing is still in its infancy, said Craig Childress, vice president of research at Envirosell, a New York-based research firm. But as retailers calibrate, cultivate, and cater to their potential customers ever more deliberately, they are taking care to select music that reflects their brand while tuning in to the tastes of their desired demographic.
It is a year-round challenge, but Christmas poses particular concerns. Research suggests holiday music really does put people in a buying mood, but too-familiar tunes -- or tunes from another generation -- can distract.
''The first time you hear 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' may be wonderful," said Daniel. ''But the 51st time may make you want to scream."
Radio doesn't help. In the late 1990s a single station in Phoenix switched to an all-Christmas music format the day after Thanksgiving, said Tom Taylor, editor of Inside Radio magazine. In the somber Christmas season that followed Sept. 11, 2001, scores of stations joined the all-Yuletide bandwagon. Taylor said 275 stations nationwide play only Christmas music during the holidays this year -- including two in Boston, WMJX-FM and WODS-FM. One Atlantic City station switched on Oct. 17.
Saturation has birthed backlash. ''Is Mall Christmas Music Psychological Terrorism?" asked Canada's National Post in 2003. Several US chains, such as Abercrombie & Fitch, don't play holiday music at all.
Other stores have broadened the holiday music definition, using spliced lyrics and remixed electronic backbeats to Christmas classics.
The hybrid is fresh enough for younger listeners but the familiar lyrics still pluck the heartstrings of traditionalists.
The remixes add a certain sophistication, said Rischel Granquist, a senior director at DMX in Austin. ''It's about being chic and beautiful and having a drink on hand and seeing beautiful people and being beautiful yourself," Granquist said. ''It's been a huge breath of fresh air for the industry."
For the Gen Y crowd, the pendulum is swinging from pop and hip-hop back to rock, Granquist said. Bands are coming out with original Christmas music with humor and hard-edged punk arrangements at their core.
One pounding song with a driving electric guitar rhythm that's found life at some stores nationwide is ''Santa Has a Mullet" by Nerf Herder, in which a beer-chugging Claus blares 1970s-era Foghat tunes as he rips through the sky in muscle cars. Another song, the spidery and subversive ''Mamacita, Donde Esta Santa Claus?" by Guster, refers to Santa's reindeer as Poncho, Pedro, Pesky, and Pasty.
Spencer Gifts moved to a more irreverent playlist two years ago after surveying customers. ''We want to be irreverent and we want bands that are hot," said Mike Champion, promotion manager for the 650-store chain. ''We're trying to make it fun and outrageous."
Exploiting this diverse audience through music is a growing field, said Childress of Envirosell. Chains such as Pottery Barn and
''People spend millions of dollars on window displays and deciding how a store will look," Childress said. ''In the next 10 years, as much attention will be spent on how a store sounds and smells."
If KB Toys is any indication, he's right. Gary Howard, manager of the toy store in Burlington, listens all day to children's versions of Christmas classics. The songs have long since grown tedious for him, but he's asked corporate headquarters to stock CDs of the playlist for sale.
Why?
''The kids love it," he said, rolling his eyes.
''I get requests for this music all day long. I'm sure I could sell 15 or 20 discs a day."
Douglas Belkin can be reached at dbelkin@globe.com 