Thank God It’s Them Instead of You

Not that Christmas songs done jukebox-musical style for those who find American Idol a little too edgy sounds promising in any case, but this has the potential to be a historic meeting of hacks, like Deep Blue Something covering Better Than Ezra or Joel Schumacher filming an Andrew Lloyd Weber musical (oh wait, that happened):

Those smiley, nasal “Glee” cast voices return for a second batch of Christmas songs…There are only two serious clunkers: a revival of the patronizing British benefit single “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” and a faithful, unadorned piano-and-voice remake of “River,” in which Lea Michele earnestly proves she’s no Joni Mitchell.

Hmm. Well, the most salient characteristics of “Do They Know it’s Christmas” are 1)its appalling aesthetic qualities and 2)its well-meaning (in a self-congratulatory way) but ultimately clunky, condescending, and offensive politics. So, actually, shouldn’t a Glee Christmas album consist of 12 versions of it?*

*On point 2 of the linked FAQ, in fairness it must be noted that the Kings of Leon were also being dicks, so Murphy had particular reason for being pissed off in that specific case.But, still, the idea that every band in the world owes it to Murphy to license their songs for the children!!!!!!!! is like a Wal-Mart manager saying that because of 9/11 his clerks should work unpaid overtime. Look, if Murphy wants to wring every last dollar out of his fans by flogging every possible shitty cover version of the most obvious pop hits on iTunes, that’s his privilege — this is America. But to pretend that selling karaoke versions of songs everyone knows is really about Educating America’s Children About the Arts, ye gods, enough of that.