Christmas Time is Here Again! The Beatles’ Christmas Records through the Years
The Beatles had a deep connection with their fans from the beginning, often writing personal letters and running official fan clubs as early as 1961. But once “Love Me Do” hit the charts, they could no longer personally engage with the thousands of new fans. Press Officer Tony Barrow suggested a solution: a special recorded Christmas message, exclusively for fan club members.
This could have seriously backfired; even the best fan club correspondences are usually undeniably cheesy. But year after year, the Beatles managed to transcend the format and do what they did best — be themselves. And no matter what was going on in their lives and careers, they didn’t abandon these special messages as they matured and progressed. In fact, the Beatles released a new record every Christmas through 1969, each one reflecting their musical and personal perspectives as one monumental year made way for another. So listen along as REBEAT takes you through seven years of funny, innovative, weird — and sometimes plain awful — Christmas messages, from them to us.
The Beatles’ Christmas Record (1963)
Awwwww… they’re so adorable! Listen to how young and enthusiastic they are, expressing gratitude for the fans and hoping they can keep on pleasing their them. Okay, it’s pretty obvious they’re reading from a script (written by Tony Barrow), so maybe it’s not the most sincere message, but it’s certainly cute, and Paul reads his part with customary affability. The others, however, have a grand old time ad-libbing and ribbing each other as they take their turn at the mic, while singing several versions of “Good King Wenceslas.” (Ringo’s lounge-lizard rendition is the best version of that song anyone ever recorded, ever.) It’s early-Beatles humor at it’s finest, making 1963 one of the most fun records in the set.
Another Beatles Christmas Record (1964)
The 1964 Christmas record followed the format of 1963’s — a scripted message thanking fans for buying the records, attending their concerts, buying John’s book, and seeing A Hard Day’s Night, with a lot more people to thank and a lot more to thank them for than in the previous year! But the script is relentlessly mocked, read (and mis-read) with a complete lack of sincerity, and totally overshadowed by ad-libs. It was recorded a few months before their second movie, Help!, began filming, and soon after they famously discovered the wonders of marijuana with Bob Dylan. So whether they’re giddy with Christmas spirit or just have the giggles is for you to decide.
The Beatles’ Third Christmas Record (1965)
The third Christmas record is more of the same, but a little looser, a little snarkier (John thanks fans for playing cards made of knickers!), and full of spontaneous break-outs into a variety of songs and impressions, though most of them don’t have anything to do with Christmas. It’s still funny, and still has the signature Beatle wit, but their fatigue is evident; as Ringo remarks: “same old mic, same old guitar, same old faces.” Tired by constant touring, filmmaking, recording, and maintaining their “Fab Four” image, the Beatles can’t hide their readiness to move in new directions.
Pantomime: Everywhere It’s Christmas (1966)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFMr2fp9w6k
With the release of Revolver and their sudden retirement from touring, 1966 completed the Beatles’ transition from lovable mop-tops to serious experimental artists—and their reinvention is clearly on display. Innocent and silly scripted messages of thanks were replaced by an original pantomime in the style of The Goon Show, filled with a mix of skits and music-hall-style songs. While this record likely took fans by surprise in comparison to previous years, non-Brits must have been even more confused by the switch to a pantomime format, a type of entertainment virtually unknown outside the UK. For the first time, Paul McCartney took complete control of the record’s production, concept, and even the album art, foreshadowing the process that led to Sgt. Pepper the following year.
Christmas Time is Here Again! (1967)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ytO2fsMjts
The fifth Christmas record builds on the previous year with another Goon Show-inspired pantomime, this time loosely-centered around a fictional BBC audition. Strange noises, unusual lyrics, and vocals that include howls and snorts make this record sound like many of the White Album songs they would soon begin recording. “Christmas Time is Here Again,” a song written especially for the record, is sung between sketches, but otherwise there is little reference to the holidays beyond John reciting a nonsense poem against an instrumental of “Auld Lang Syne.” Sadly, this marks the last time the Beatles would record a fan club Christmas record as a foursome.
The Beatles’ 1968 Christmas Record (1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXyUxdrWQcY
Now at the height of animosity toward one another, the four Beatles recorded their messages separately for the first time. The result? A Christmas record with almost no Christmas spirit. Songs from the newly-recorded White Album, snippets of opera, and experimental sounds are interspersed with odd, bored, and disjointed messages from the Beatles. Paul sings a throwaway holiday song, but the boredom in his voice is nothing compared to George’s, who sounds like he could barely be bothered. John, focused on his newfound infatuation with Yoko Ono, read his poem, “Jock and Yono,” not about Christmas in the least, but a good poem nonetheless. And Ringo — the only Beatle who seems at all interested in spreading holiday cheer — hardly appears. Of all the oddities here, the oddest is the ending, when Tiny Tim appears as a guest performer, singing his… um… unusual rendition of “Nowhere Man,” not exactly the most festive song. God bless us, every one?
Happy Christmas 1969! (1969)
The Beatles would officially break up four months after they made this record, but in reality, fighting, legal troubles, and drifting paths had broken them up well before. If fans hadn’t figured this out by now, this seventh and final Christmas record, again recorded separately and patched together, makes that sad fact painfully clear. John and Yoko’s conversations and songs feature more prominently than the Beatles as a group, appearing four times between the others’ contributions. George is once again barely there, and Ringo shows up mainly to plug his new film, The Magic Christian. Paul’s short song, “This is to Wish You a Merry Christmas,” is an acoustic solo that feels like it was recorded miles away from any of the others (and it likely was). Despite what is mainly a sad little record, John, in either a stroke of brilliance or luck, manages to bring all seven holiday records full circle with a rendition of “Good King Wenceslas,” a callback to the song they couldn’t get enough of as enthusiastic young Beatles in 1963.
