John & Ray Ruin Christmas - Song List

For anybody that is interested, here is the second part of the retrospective on the infamous cult classic "John & Ray Ruin Christmas."

Now that I've told the whole horrifying story of the how's and why's of the creation of this holiday not-so-classic, let me now give a run down of the song selection. I'm pretty much just going off the handwritten original info book that I have with the master copy of the cassette. If it's not on there, then it doesn't exist and anything that you hear on the tape that isn't covered here is a figment of your imagination.

1. Introduction - For whatever reason, this is the only non-music track that I listed on the track sheet. Ray and I used the classic "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies" by the Nutcracker (Tchaikovsky) as our intro music. We also used on every subsequent version of Ruin Christmas. It should be noted that our "joke" about the Christmas tree on fire was really forced and sounds ridiculous... especially since we laugh through the whole thing.

2. Blue Christmas
3. Santa Claus is Back in Town
4. Santa Bring My Baby Back to Me
Ahhh, the Elvis block. Three glorious songs by Elvis Presley. Many, many people think Elvis was a fantastic singer/entertainer. I find him to be ridiculous. These three songs are fabulously goofy because of Elvis "style"... meaning, Elvis likes to make odd sounds that aren't really words, not really musical, but can't even be classified as scat. just weird, rhythmic goofy sounds.
And then there are the backup singers. Backup singers in the early days of rock n' roll were always a little out of place, but the Jordanaires just went with Elvis like wine goes with fried pickles. I get this image of Elvis running amuck on eggnog and sugar cookies, making goofy sounds and singing songs about Santa driving Cadillacs and kidnapping women. All the while, here are these guys in the back of the room singing backup in tuxedos and trying to add an air of seriousness to the ludicrous nature that is Elvis' Christmas Album.

5. Hark, the Herald Angels Sing
6. Silent Night
The Quackers from The Quacker's Christmas Album
Truly, truly horrifying. Until you hear this, you really can't understand just why we advise you to not listen to this while driving. Somebody, somewhere thought they could do an amusing Donald Duck impersonation, put together a band of synthesized country musicians, and made this. And sold this. Words do not do the awfulness justice.

7. Howdy Doody Christmas
Howdy Doody & The Fontane Sisters from A TV Family Christmas
I was not alive when Howdy Doody was on. For that I'm grateful. I realize that many in my parents generation idolized HD when they were children, but lets face it... he was a creepy marionette. Not only is he weirdness on strings, but his idea of a fun Christmas song is downright disturbing.
During this song, he hits on the backup singers, mispronounces several words, adds extra syllables to other words, and then yells malevolently at everybody to make them understand that it's a "Howdy Doody Christmas"... whatever the hell that is.

8. Christmas With the Devil
Spinal Tap from Break Like the Wind
Okay, granted it's a joke band that is intentionally "bad", but the sentiment is perfect for ruining Christmas and the song is hilarious. This one you can actually enjoy, even if it doesn't make you feel all that festive.

9. Santa Cow
10. Twelve Days of Christmas
from It's a Cow Christmas
I don't what the deal with this album was. It was bad and much of was unlistenable bad. Just not entertaining at all. And yet, there were a couple of gems that were just so odd that they, along with the Quackers, became the foundation of this whole project. Santa Cow is this bizarre song about cows in a barn that exeprience "Twas the Night Before Christmas" in their own bovine way. Santa Cow is a cow that drives a sleigh pulled by other cows and delivers gifts to cows. It doesn't make much sense and I still have a hard time following the "plot." The backup singers are pretty entertaining.
The Twelve Days of Christmas is performed by some dopey cow that has no rhythm or ability to sing in the right key. The things the farmer gives to the cow are just ridiculous. I mean... poodles?
Strangely enough, this album has apparently become a minor collectible. At most online shops, I see this for sale used at above the original retail price. It's long out of print.

11. Santa Baby
Eartha Kitt from Billboard Greatest Christmas Hits 1935-1954
First off, I was sorry to hear of Ms. Kitt's recent passing on Christmas Day '08. Largely because of this song and its inclusion here, I always been kinda fond of her.
Eartha was, judging by this song, ahead of Madonna as the original "Material Girl" by a good 30 years. It's holiday greed at it's finest. And it's seductive too... not at all what you'd expect from the "good old days" where nobody had sex and everybody was a good Christian.
I cringe a little bit when I hear us mock this song. We were unfamiliar with it, mostly. I actually like the song, but it would still earn a spot on the list for the anti-Christmas spirit of getting that it promotes.

12. Jimgle Bells
Pierre from Jacques Cousteau's Underwater Christmas
Much like the Quackers, this bit was brought about by a voice that I could do. No, not Cousteau since this might be the worst French accent ever recorded. It's the "underwater" voice of Pierre.
This is one of several times over the years that I did more than one voice in a live recorded skit. Ray, while a very funny guy, is not so good with voices. He can do Arnold Schwarzenegger and Elvis... and that's about it. In fact, everytime he tried to do an accent or something, it inevitably turned into either Arnold or Elvis. So, I had to do a lot of the impersonations.

13. Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer
Elmo & Patsy from Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer
Earlier in the tape, Ray and explain that the songs we use are ones that either aren't supposed to be bad but are anyway or songs that you might not be so familiar with. Well, this one fails both of those. Everybody knows this song and everybody knows that its bad. Why did we put it on here? Filler.

14. Christmas at Ground Zero
"Weird Al" Yankovic from Polka Party
I'm a Weird Al fan. What can I say? And this song is the peppiest yuletide nuclear armaggeddon song you will ever hear.

15. I'm Dressin' Up Like Santa (When I Get Out on Parole)
16. The Chimney Song
Bob River's Comedy Troupe from Twisted Christmas
I really hate this album. When I was a kid and it first came out, it was kind of amusing. But now, it's just annoying in that bad comedy album sort of way.

17. Santa Looked a Lot Like Daddy
Buck Owens from A TV Family Christmas
Ahhhhh... Hee Haw... one of the worst television programs ever to be broadcast on American TV (pre-reality TV era). This song, performed by the legendary Buck Owens, isn't really that bad, but it is pretty goofy. It's very "sittin' on grandpa's porch in the Ozarks" country and I feel like I need to put on overalls everytime it comes on.

18. Twas the Night Before Christmas II
Anonymous from Christmas Stuff
I wrote this back in the 4th grade. For whetever reason, I decided I needed to write a parody of Twas the Night Before Christmas. The version here is largely my original text, but there were several changes. Things that were funny to me as an 8 year old just seemed absurd and out of place at age 17.
The most interesting piece of trivia about this track is that it was recorded in one take. The Halloween sound effects tape used as the background was NOT listened to prior to pressing the record button. We just put the tape in and hit play and I started reading. Consequently, when the scary monster guy starts talking about 10 seconds in, I wasn't expecting it and was in fact actually about to start speaking. The crazy thing is how the Halloween tape and the poem actually link up in several spots. It's almost Wizard of Oz/Pink Floyd.

19. Rubber Chicken Christmas Song
Esther & The Spatulas from The Trees and Your Mashed Potatoes
This might be my favorite part of this whole stupid project. This is Ed Wood if he was a musician. I find this song so bad that it's actually good in a weird abstract, avant garde sort of way. Despite the three of us (Ray, my sister, and me) all playing instruments willy nilly, there's a bit of rhythm and a slight tune. I like my rubber chicken voice and the words are just so stupid, I can't help but smile.
The Rudolph the Rubber Chicken part was hard for me to say as fast as i needed to and so somewhere, I have a tape of outtakes where I keep screwing this part up and getting angry and yelling... all while still doing the rubber chicken voice.

20. There Goes Santa Claus
Invisible Toasters from Dehydrated
Ray wrote this, I sang it. Not sure why I pronounced "sirens" the way I did.

21. The Christmas Song
Dirty Laundry from Cowboys and Hamsters
Ray wrote and sang this. It's really a horrific song and pretty disturbing. Listening to it now, I'm surprised that Ray could be that dark.

22. Deck the Halls
Honkville Duck Chorus from Christmas in Honkville
Ummmm.... Geez, this is gonna take some explaining. I'm not going to go too deep into this here, but Honkville was a town in Idaho populated by ducks and the people who idolized the ducks. Ray and I created this thing after a History assignment gone wrong and it it went horribly out of control (we actually produced a daily paper for several months). The ducks can do anything people can, except they don't speak English. Thinking about that, it really makes no sense. They can drive cars, hold down jobs, write books.... but not speak English. Weird.

23. A Message from the King
Bob River's Comedy Troupe from Twisted Christmas
Oh look... we're running out of material... time to fill space!

24. Twelve Days of Christmas
25. Carol of the Cowbells
from It's a Cow Christmas
More space filler... we play that stupid cow song again and then a not that bad version song in Carol of the Cowbells

26. Santa's Beard
They Might Be Giants from Lincoln
A last minute addition to fill time. TMBG's Lincoln is still one fabulous album.

Additional songs that for whatever reason I didn't include in the track listing include some other Quackers songs, including the unbelievably stupid "I'm a Rubber Duck", A medley of three christmas songs played at the same time, and "O Christmas Tree" sung by my sister in ear bleeding falsetto.

Finally, I'd just like to say that I talk way too much on this thing and try way too hard to be funny. I should have shut up and let Ray talk more.

John & Ray Ruin Christmas

Title: John & Ray Ruin Christmas
Date: 1992
Category: Noise
Current Status: Available through Guru Bob Records…. Cheap.


“Well, it’s that season again…”

That’s how the thing started. At least that’s how the finished tape began. The opening lines of “John & Ray Ruin Christmas” have been a running joke (at least for Ray and me) since 1992 when we made that awful album. This is technically NOT from the attic, but its cult status and relevance to the season makes it worth discussing.

We decided to make an album collecting terrible Christmas music; either stuff we found to sound unmusical, stuff that had totally the wrong sentiment for Christmas, and stuff we just thought was more goofy than festive. For whatever reason, we thought it would be fun to make a tape and convince other people to listen to it. And while it had extremely limited distribution (like, maybe 12 copies), people remember it. I don’t know if the remember it because they enjoyed it or just because it was so bad that it’s now a minor trauma in their heads.

It all started one evening in the Fall of 1992. I think Ray and I had gone to a Fort Worth Fire Hockey match and had decided to get dinner afterwards. We ended up at a Harrigan’s on Hulen Street in Fort Worth. We placed our orders and then decided to leave our table (we let our server know) and run next door to what was then a Sound Warehouse (the space is now occupied by Half Price Books) and browse. They had a big section of Christmas Music (since Christmas was nigh) and we started finding all sorts of weirdo stuff. The two that I specifically remember were “The Quackers Christmas Special” and “It’s a Cow Christmas.” At any rate, we bought some stuff and went back and had dinner.

On the way home, we decided to check out some of the crap we bought. The Quackers, I’m pretty sure, were first. We put in the tape and started to hear some nice, bland synthesized Christmas music. Okay. Then the “singing” started. And when I say singing, I mean sound that resembled Donald Duck in a drunken stupor. Ray, who was driving, and I completely lost it. I mean full on, nearly wrecked the car, side hurting laughter ensued. It was awful. In fact, when we first released the tape, we warned people not to listen to the Quackers while driving. One listener didn’t take that advice and later agreed it was a good warning.

It’s a Cow Christmas was next and most of it was boring bad, but there were a couple of tracks that were just ridiculous, namely “The Twelve Days of Christmas” and “Santa Cow.”

It was decided that we needed to share this with the world (or as many people as possible).

Over the Thanksgiving break, Ray and I proceeded to create a playlist of stuff we had recently acquired (Thanks to Forever Young records, too!). Back then, we had limited technical skill, even more limited audio equipment, and almost no money. We didn’t have microphones, editing equipment, multitrack… we had an old boombox with an indeck mic. So, we would speak our bits, stop the tape, dub the song, and then record more of us talking. Totally Old School.
We loosely scripted the thing. By that, I mean we talked out the rough parameters of what we were going to say and then hit record. If we screwed up, we re-recorded it.

I don’t remember if we didn’t have quite enough material or just thought it would be amusing to record some “original” works for this project, but whatever the reason, we recorded 7 originals for this thing. These were done with the help of my sister (she could play the flute and therefore was our primary musician) and were recorded live. I have the tape of outtakes with some alternate versions (mainly because the arrangements were pure anarchy and you never knew for sure what each person was going to play). We used a Casio keyboard, flute, several wood recorders, harmonica, toy drum, French horn, kazoo, and one of those spirally door stoppers that make the really funny sound when you let it spring back.

Once we completed the thing, and by the time we finished, it had lost quite a bit of the fun factor, we set about advertising it at school. We sold about 10 or 12 copies. Each copy was hand numbered with a photocopied insert/program and I believe unique holiday art. Each cassette cover had some poorly rendered Christmas related image done in high quality crayola.

Chris Heinefield told me he played it so much his Dad threatened to take it away. Mr. Powell played it class the last day of school before break while we mixed dangerous chemicals together in festive holiday colors.

We even though it would be fun to send it to some radio stations in the naïve hope that somebody would listen to it and play it on the air. Man, we were dumb.

At any rate, people seemed to like it. Why? I have no idea. I listen to it from time to time and I find it hard to listen to now. Granted, I’m usually uber-critical of my own work and the production values are minimal. Plus, I’ve heard it a gazillion times and it isn’t nearly as funny anymore.

We ended up liking the idea of these kinds of things and started making more silly audio tapes. There was “John & Ray Trash Disco”, “John & Ray’s Stupid Music”, “John & Ray Ruin ANOTHER Christmas” and some random audio sketches and unfinished songs. In the late 90’s, we upgraded our equipment from “stolen from a garage sale” to “purchased from a discount store” and recorded “John & Ray Ruin Christmas: The Special Edition.” This was largely are favorite (least favorite) songs from the other two Christmas tapes combined with some new material, including the awful “Santa’s Comin’ down the Chimney” by Bubbles McIntire. Our pal Randy Black helped out on this one. All of these tapes have virtually zero distribution.

In 2000, we somehow ended up back on the air at KTCU as Dead Air Radio (with producer Wade “2-Tons of Love” Goodman and regular appearances by James “DJ Jaime” Reimer and Neep “Happy the Rodeo Clown” Preissinger). Deciding to dust off the virtually unknown franchise again, we did the whole thing live during our three hour show. And we did it one more time as “Dead Air Radio Ruins Christmas in July.”

I’m slowly getting all of this junk transferred to CD and MP3 to try and get it available to any nut that wants it and maybe get lucky and have it become the next viral promotion on the internets. I’ve heard worse.

All of this is how I remember it, but I’ve had a fair amount of Belgian beer since then. Ray might remember it differently. Heck, you might remember it differently. If anybody remembers it differently, let me know and I’ll post a follow up.

The next post will have a track-by-track breakdown.Anybody that wants a copy of the original JARRC, contact me.