When is it too early to start playing holiday music?

(Cross-posted at BlogHer)

A mere twelve hours after Halloween's end my cable provider's Sound of the Seasons station was playing holiday music.

Aren't we supposed to wait until after Thanksgiving? At least? I'm not the only blogger lamenting the premature appearance of holiday tunes.

Heck, the Halloween candy is still on sale, and we already can't escape good cheer and holiday schmaltz. Sure, nothing compares to hearing the Pogues' "Fairytale of New York," Wham!'s "Last Christmas" and Waitresses' "Christmas Wrapping" for the first time in a season -- but will they grow stale by December 22 when the holiday season really kicks into high gear?

(A to Z)

I'd like to say I'm one of those people who loves holiday music, but I'm not. Far from it. I think the only album I own with a true "Christmas" song is a Ramones best-of with "Merry Christmas, I Don't Want To Fight." When pressured, I tell people my favorite holiday song is Joni Mitchell's "River," but it's only Christmas-y in theme, and pretty damn depressing to boot. Let's face it, holiday music just isn't cool. From The Guardian:

But to break through the X Factor stranglehold on the December chart, there can be no smirk, no irony, no subtext. The office Christmas party cognescenti do not wish to be challenged, sneered at or patronised. You've got to shake those sleigh bells with heartfelt conviction, wear the tinsel tiara with pride, duet with Bing Crosby in your chunkiest snow-scene sweater and love it.

Indie rock to the rescue?

This isn't the first time that Canadian indie rockers have riffed on Do They Know It's Christmas? In 2005, a band called the Unicorns were joined by Arcade Fire, Beck, Devendra Banhart, Karen O, Peaches and more to release an October single called Do They Know It's Halloween?, with all proceeds going to Unicef. And Fucked Up themselves have a tradition of celebrity singalongs – for a 2007 Christmas single they enlisted Nelly Furtado, the Black Lips and LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy to rock along to Stars On 45.

The blogger at We *heart* Music are getting into the spirit by already publishing their Christmas Music Guide 2009.

Or you have a last.fm account could do a tag search for "holiday music." Since the songs are tagged by other last.fm listeners, you can be guaranteed the playlist is as diverse as any, probably more so than your average radio station. (Where else can you hear Mariah Carey juxtaposed with Revered Horton Heat?)

See? Holiday music doesn't have to suck?