Every December, you’ll hear some wonderful Christmas favorites on the radio, the TV, and in every store you enter. But there are some Christmas songs that really should be banished to the do-not-play list. From annoying melodies and questionable lyrics to ear worms that permanently lodge themselves in your head, these are the Christmas songs we love to hate — including one inescapable tune that just made music history.
This pop hit actually topped The Mirror’s poll of the most hated Christmas songs, yet you’re sure to hear it playing nearly everywhere this holiday season. In fact, it holds the top spot on Billboard's Greatest of All Time Holiday 100 Songs. Regardless of your feelings on Mariah Carey, who has always been polarizing, the song is always delivered at one volume — loud — and is gratingly repetitive.
Related: Holiday Movies for People Who Hate Holiday Movies
We’ve all heard this song many times. Many of us can recite the dialogue and sing the lyrics. But after hearing it a dozen times a season, the Chipmunks’ voices start to grate and this song becomes wholeheartedly annoying.
For more funny holiday articles, please sign up for our free newsletters.
Complete with its ‘80s synthesizer and smooth vocals, this song may have appealed at one point, but now it’s an overplayed addition to Christmas radio. Worse, artists like Carly Rae Jepsen have covered it, so there are even more versions out there to listen to — none an actual improvement on the original.
We didn’t list an artist for this song because no matter who sings it, in this day and age, the lyrics about a man’s coercing and manipulating a woman still sound creepy. While some artists have attempted to release more politically correct versions, this is one song that we should just stop playing.
This isn’t to say that “Jingle Bells” is a bad song. We love “Jingle Bells” — just versions of it that aren’t this one. David Hasselhoff’s take doesn’t do this classic justice and feels overproduced.
Related: Song Lyrics Everyone Gets Wrong
Many of Michael Bublé’s Christmas songs are great, but his reimagining of this classic flopped. Buble changes some key lyrics of the song — mainly, the title. Santa Baby is now Santa Buddy, and the whole song feels just a little off as a result.
There are few Christmas songs that are bigger earworms than Dominick the Donkey. If you hear this song, or even think of it, you’ll be singing it and humming it on repeat for days. The sheer annoyance factor makes it a song worthy of a hate list.
New Kids on the Block released tons of hits. This isn’t one of them. The band couldn’t resist including a self-promotional shoutout right before the first verse, and the rest of the song feels flat, dull, and awkward.
Far from Bieber’s best work, “Mistletoe” is a failed take on Christmas romance. The repeated use of “shorty” makes it a song that’s hard to stomach.
Intended as a joke, this song is fun the first dozen or so times. Unfortunately, it’s also one of those Christmas songs that’s been so overplayed that it’s lost its appeal. It will easily get stuck in your head, so if you hear it once, you won’t be escaping its nasally melody anytime soon.
This is another song that’s fun the first few times, but then it gets old. It’s a little too cutesy and can be hard to hear repeatedly during the season, so this is a song that should be played with caution.
This song has energy and rhythm, but it’s failed by the melody and lyrics. The chorus of “Bonga, bonga, bonga, do the Christmas conga” puts it solidly into the list of Christmas songs to hate.
Some songs should just be left untouched in their original form. When Maroon 5 took on this holiday classic, originally written and performed by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, the result was a song that largely felt empty. Unfortunately, not even Adam Levine’s falsetto could fill what was missing.
Related: 12 Enduring Quotes From John Lennon
This song changes into different Christmas melodies so many times it’s hard to keep up. The sexual Christmas tree references are also hard to stomach in a Christmas song. This is a song most people would be happy to never hear again.
If you haven’t heard this song, consider yourself lucky. It’s all of two minutes long, yet its syrupy sweet melody seems to repeat endlessly, making the song feel a whole lot longer than it is. It consists entirely of two melodic phrases, so you’ll never get this tune out of your head.
Songs don’t get much more repetitive than “The 12 Days of Christmas,” and it’s rare to find an artist who performs this song beautifully. By verse five, the song has become pretty dull, but it’s a long listen. We’d rather listen to another song with better entertainment value.
Related: Classic Holiday Movies That Still Hold Up
Yes, that’s a song — and yes, it’s about a father getting drunk on Christmas and falling down underneath the Christmas tree. The juxtaposition of such a sad subject with what’s supposed to be a happy season means this song lacks any hint of holiday cheer.
Smashing Pumpkins did dark, angry music well. The group didn’t do Christmas music well, and this song is a result. Somewhere between moody and celebratory, this song evokes a listening experience that’s best described as bizarre.
The combination of the song title and band name should give a sense of what this song is. Loudly sung in a straining voice, this song is everything that a Christmas song isn’t. The song basically tells off an ex and doesn’t make for enjoyable listening.
This song depicts the urban legend of a boy who wants to buy shoes for his mother who’s dying of cancer. He wants her to look beautiful when she meets Jesus. While the message is intended to be genuine, it’s hard to listen to the song without finding it tacky.