Have Yourself a Funky (& Funny) Christmas With These Christmas Songs

Break out the homemade eggnog, pin some mistletoe on your hat like my granny does (I swear the woman’s totally incorrigible!) and bust some moves to these funky yuletime tunes.

These songs are my top 10 funky and funny christmas songs -- some funny, some funky, some both -- in no particular order.

Some of the content in a few of these songs is bit ho ho ho-ey so they're better suited for big elf parties, but a few of the songs are kid friendly.

This list is a mix of Christmas hip hop songs, Christmas funk and blues Songs and Christmas cartoon songs. If you have a favorite Christmas song that is funny, funky or both let me know! Ok here we go...

1. Beatbox Christmas aka What Happens When You Make Black People Take Care o' Yo Kids for 400 years

2. James Brown - Soulful Christmas. JB cuts rugs into shreds. Owwww! Good God.

3. Snoop Dogg - Snoop Dogg Christmas (Explicit). I like this video more than the song, but the song is catchy too. LOL at the gay elf and David Hasselhoff in a speedo.

4. Chingo Bells - Chingo Bling. I'm kinda diggin his take on Run DMC's classic, Christmas in Hollis. This one's for my ese's.

5. Albert King - Santa Claus Wants Some Lovin

6. Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto - James Brown from James Brown's Funky Christmas

7. Spongebob Squarepants - Don't Be a Jerk (It's Christmas)

8. 2-Cent Christmas (The Ultimate Hip Hop Parody)

9. Back Door Santa, by the incomparable Clarence Carter. The opening seconds of this song might sound familiar to some of you.

10. Charles Brown - Please Come Home for Christmas, a classy tune I heard all the time this time of year when I was growing up. Grab a partner and do a drunken slow drag to this.

This post was inspired by Egon's Have Yourself a Funky Little Christmas.

Here are more funky and funny Christmas songs. If there's a Christmas song you think should be on this list let me know!

 creative use of 1000 bottles of Heineken

Take care of yourself and happy holidays! This post has been brought to you by my 30 Day Blogging Challenge.

Technorati Tags: funny Christmas songs,funky Christmas songs,Christmas songs

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RIP 227 and Sesame Street's Alaina Reed Amini, Brittany Murphy

Sad news for all fans of the 80s sitcom 227. Alaina Reed Amini aka Alaina Reed Hall has crossed over to the other side yall. She died of breast cancer.

Reed Hall portrayed "Rose" on the show that was a beloved part of many 80s babies' evening TV viewing schedule, along with shows like "The Cosby Show", "What's Happening" and "A Different World".

When these shows came on, you couldn't unglue my bee-hind from my babysitter's plastic couch covers until they were all over, and if memory serves me correctly they all seemed to come on in one big block of time.

Alaina Reed Hall also played Gordon's younger sister "Olivia" on Sesame Street. She was 63.

According to Alaina Reed Hall's Wikipedia page, she died on my birthday, but I think many media outlets may have just received the press release about her death yesterday, which may be why the news is just being reported.

I just love Best Week Ever's tribute to this under appreciated actress: "5 Things That Made Alaina Reed Hall Awesome".

Breast cancer also recently took the life of comedian Charlie Murphy's wife, Tisha Murphy.

News of Reed Hall's death may have also been overshadowed by the death of Brittany Murphy.

I think one of Brittany Murphy's best roles was in 8 Mile. Or at least that's the role that stands out to me. She was also the voice of "Luanne" on King of the Hill.

As happens when young people die unexpectedly, people in the media and around the world wonder why.

Brittany Murphy died from a heart attack and rumors have already started about, as Cinematical put it, "anorexia and drug addiction, diabetes and thyroid problems..."

The thyroid bit is especially frightening to me and hits very close to home. In January of 2009, I dipped a pinky toe into death's waters when I almost died of a heart attack from my thyroid issues.

In other December death news, Oral Roberts also passed away recently.

Wow. Is it me or do people seem to be leaving this planet (plane) left and right? Or are we just more aware of these deaths because of the nature of the media?

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How Dope Would It Be to Rock a Mic on This?

The people on the book are performing the opera Aida.

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Art Mashup: Samurai Stormtrooper

Wow, great concept.

This post brought to you by my 30 Day Blogging Challenge.

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Today is My Birthday...and Manny Pacquiao's Too!

Happy Birthday to me...and Manny Pacquiao! Wow what good fortune to have the same birthday as my favorite pugilist.


I won't be doing much celebrating as I'm working on stories all day today, but I'll have a special CD on rotation that puts me in a party mood and you can download it here on HeavyMentalist.com for a limited time for free! Details on downloading the CD below.

 

 Happy Birthday Manny!

Some other cool people share December 17 for their birthday too, like these folks:

Chris Matthews

Eddie Kendricks

Ernie Hudson

Bob Guccione

Milla Jovovich

William Safire, RIP

and more!

If you're into astrology, this page has my chart for the day (down in the lower left sidebar). I have no idea what that chart means but it looks cool, I guess. Feel free to break it down for me if you are into astrology.

Even though I don't know much about astrology I must say this astrological bio of people born on December 17 hits pretty damn close to home!

I would even say frighteningly so. I don't know about the "money" part lol but I'm certainly working towards it.

As I noted earlier I won't be doing much celebrating today as I'm working on getting a couple of stories turned in, but I will be putting a certain mix CD into rotation.

I can't remember the DJ I got this from and the tracks are unnamed, but it's a CD of 1980's classic soul music hits and party songs from various artists.

Acts whose songs I recognize on this CD include Slave, Teena Marie, Rick James, Stephanie Mills, Zapp & Roger, Cheryl Lynn, Me'Lisa Morgan, George Clinton & the Funkadelics, Keni Burke, the Gap Band and more.

Here it is - 4 Grown Folks Only Mix CD. I didn't name this CD, it came to me with this name on it but I think today it is especially appropritate, enjoy! Happy birthday to everyone else with the same birthday today!

This post has been brought to you by my 30 day blogging challenge.

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RIP Tisha Murphy, Wife of Charlie Murphy

photo from Ballerwives.com

Tisha Murphy succumbed to breast cancer this week, leaving husband Charlie Murphy a single father of their three children.

Ava (L), Xavier (R). Murphy also has an adult son from a prior relationship. Photo from blackcelebkids.com

Charlie Murphy, the older brother of Eddie Murphy is best known for his role recurring role on the Chappelle Show, though he's also had parts in several movies mostly written and marketed for an African-American audience.

Although he's lesser known than his little brother, Charlie Murphy is hella funny and is currently carrying the stand up comic mantle while his brother focuses on film projects like Norbit.

Breast cancer continues to be the most diagnosed cancer for women nationwide, and is especially dangerous for African-American women. According to Netwellness.org:

African American women are more likely than white women to be diagnosed at later stages of the disease and are more likely to die from it.

Cancer has touched my family, with one of my aunts having had a breast removed due to breast cancer, and another aunt dying from cervical cancer.

Cancer continues to leave few families unscathed with an average of 1 in 3 people developing some type of cancer at some point in their lives.

RIP Tisha Murphy.

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What Do You Think This Song’s About?

art by ghozt159

Some think it's about the green. Or in this case, the purp.

Some think it's about black women.Some even think it's about a gang. But there are at least three different theories floating around about the lyrics of this reggae classic: Barrington Levy’s “Black Roses”.

The lyrics to this song have inspired a long running Youtube discussion, with theories ranging from the obvious, to this song being about Jamaica's Black Roses Crew. You can see master Jamaican danceman Bogle (RIP) mention “black roses” in this video at 4:38.

When I hear it I know what I think about. 

Everyday, when I’m up before the sun making sure my babies are dressed warmly and fed, and sending them off with faces washed, teeth brushed and hair did, I picture sistas across the world rising in the morning and doing the same thing.

I picture women working through the night, getting shit done...even things we might not like doing...to make sure a roof is always over your seeds head, going thru bad dad drama – whether it’s yours or your child's - and dealing with the everyday ignance that makes you wanna Elin a bitch.

I think about the level of disrespect for women that permeates popular culture when I'm writing, I think about our youth when I'm watching TV and when I’m standing in my tiny kitchen with blue vinyl floor tiles, a few of which have started to curl in the corner, cooking dinner and staring at the radio lamenting the state of our music.

There’s just so much stuff black women go through that is unique to our struggle, and women around the world really, are always on my mind.

I’m dedicating this to all of you moms holding it down everyday.



See you tomorrow. This post brought to you by my 30 day blogging challenge.

UPDATE:  12-11-09 | 11:20 AM

Just saw an interesting comment about this song. Still not sure exactly what the song is about, because only Barrington Levy knows that but I love this explanation from Youtuber jfraiche (click on the screen capture to enlarge it):

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Some Good Pickin' with the Carolina Chocolate Drops

Here's a quickie post for you guys and gals tonight featuring some of my favorite African-American ol' time country blues musicians.

How many of you knew modern African-American banjo pickers even existed?

Well you can butter my butt and call me a biscuit, because until I saw some videos of this group I was unaware that there were contemporary African-American musicians not only making this type of music - but making it popular.

I've known about the theory of the banjo originating in Africa for some time now, and about enslaved Africans playing the banjo on plantations across the South. I even publicized a gathering of black banjo pickers some years ago in an old issue of the North Carolina All City Times.


But to find out the recent African-American banjo revival is gaining momentum is so wonderful right now, at a time when most modern music seems so stale.


After you watch the videos let's discuss! What do you think about the African-American banjo tradiiton? Are you feeling this group? Do you know about other groups like this I should check out?


I'm anxious to explore forms of African-American, country, ol' time and country blues sounds. And now without further adu...the Carolina Chocolate Drops!

"Cornbread and Butter Beans"

"Hit 'Em Up Style" (Not really feeling this version of Blu Cantrell's hit but thought someone might like it.)

This blog post brought to you by my 30 Day Blogging Challenge. See you tomorrow!

Technorati Tags: carolina chocolate drops,bnajo,ol time,old time,country blues

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Better Than Swine Flu

Love the Ethiopians.

Technorati Tags: ethiopians,ska,trojan reggae,skinhead

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Some Pretty Damn Good House Dancing

My last house video was for a great song but the dancers IMHO failed to do the song justice, even with such a cool video. I know the whole point of the video was just to express feelings of love for life, music, people, etc., but I thought the feeling in the song could have been expressed equally as well with any good house dancer like the kind you'd find at your local house parties every Thursday through Sunday.

One dancer was really giving it, right when D.A.W. or Dancers at Work appears in green on the screen, but then the video ends and that dancer gets down for like fifteen seconds.

I love house music and want to present some great house dancing on this blog so I'll start with this next video. Here’s a guy who represents the art of house dance well. House dancing is mostly footwork based, but upper body carriage is important too.

This isn’t one of my favorite songs, but the dancing is enjoyable. I wish I could mash up this video with the Cerca De Mi one. Gimme a day or two to work on it and i just might.

Technorati Tags: house music,dance

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