Listen to Iggy Pop’s give a wretched cover of ‘White Christmas’
Ever wondered what Bing Crosby’s Christmas classic ‘White Christmas’ would sound like sung by a semi-nude iguana? Me neither, but you’re about to find out. The powerful image of Iggy Pop, the former frontman of The Stooges and frequent David Bowie collaborator, wailing, “Gimme danger little stranger” across a riotous audience is among the most iconic in rock history, but not particularly Christmassy.
While Christmas songs have been a staple presence of the holiday season for decades, the global popularisation of rock music in the 1960s led to a particularly fertile ’70s. For better or worse, the decade spawned many classics that we still play incessantly some five decades on, including Slade’s ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’, Greg Lake’s ‘I Believe in Father Christmas’, Wizzard’s ‘I Wish it could be Christmas Everyday’ and John Lennon’s ‘Happy Christmas (War is Over)’.
Such songs are undoubtedly rather fun to record, but the payout is certainly a bonus. According to a 2013 report by the Performing Right Society, Noddy Holder and his merry men in Slade still rake in a whopping £512,000 each Christmas for their festive classic.
Sadly, Iggy Pop was too busy revolutionising music for the punk wave in the 1970s and forgot to record his Christmas cash cow. However, in 2009, the so-called Godfather of Punk recorded a cover of Bing Crosby’s 1942 classic ‘White Christmas’.
The song was written by Irving Berlin for the 1942 musical movie Holiday Inn. Needless to say, the song stretched its legs far beyond 1942 and still turns over $300,000 each year, according to The Independent. Not only is ‘White Christmas’ the highest-selling Christmas song of all time, having sold a staggering 50 million copies, but it is also the highest-selling single of all time across all genres.
Of course, Iggy likely didn’t have dollar signs in his eyes when he chose ‘White Christmas’ for a moody, tongue-in-cheek, festive cover; finances hadn’t plagued the star’s anxiety dreams for decades, and let’s face it, not many people were going to pay their hard-earned cash to hear Iggy attempting a Crosby croon.
Iggy’s unlikely Christmas cover was released as the first track on the 2009 various artists compilation album, An All-Star Salute To Christmas, and also featured on Punk Rock Christmas in 2015. As a big fan of Iggy’s work, I can’t help but enjoy it, but it’s not what most would deem festive.
