Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas Is You is the most popular Christmas song across all states in America, but as a Newsweek map shows, many states have their own favorites.
Carey's hit was the Number One song on the Billboard Hot 100 last year, as well as the previous four years during the festive season. It was the most listened to song in Illinois, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and Georgia, according to data collected by Finance Buzz on Google Trends.
But other songs that were the favorites in at least three states included, Run Rudolph Run, It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year, Jingle Bells, Deck The Halls, and Feliz Navidad.
However, probably due to its popularity which means it is endlessly played during the month of December, All I Want For Christmas Is You was also ranked as the "most annoying" Christmas song in a survey conducted by Finance Buzz.
Asking a sample of 1,250 Americans, the outlet found, despite being another favorite, Feliz Navidad was ranked the third most annoying song. Deck The Halls was also branded annoying, ranking sixth.
Even though they can become overplayed around the festive season and drive us crazy, Christmas songs are still widely loved.
Speaking to Newsweek about how Christmas songs have endless popularity, Jambox Entertainment Inc Music Producer Lee Evans said, "Christmas songs are great if they are memorable, and they touch that common nerve we all have around the holidays."
While in other music genres, songs try to be "new, trendy, and somewhat daring, Christmas music tends to be nostalgic and bring up a feeling of family and togetherness," she said.
Evans, who is currently working on a number of Christmas songs, explained that any song that is endlessly popular will have a "simple, catchy hook, and is about a relatable topic," pointing to how we all remember nursery rhymes, like we remember classic Christmas songs.
Musicians seem to be keen to get their names on the billboards this year as a number of big name releases have already come out.
This includes Kelly Clarkson's new album When Christmas Come Around … Again. The album was dropped on Spotify on November 1, and teased with a release of one of its songs, You For Christmas, which came out in September.
A new album that came out even earlier was When I Think Of Christmas by Vince Gill and Amy Grant, being added to Spotify on September 13.
Orville Peck, a musician who is known for wearing a mask covering his face during his performances, released a single before December too, called Happy Trails, which was added to Apple Music on October 25.
The singer behind Tik Tok and featured on Pitbull's Timber, Kesha, also released a single in October called Holiday Road.
With many more new songs coming out this year for Christmas, it'll be interesting to see if any of the old classics are replaced with any of these newbies.
Based on data collected by The Washington Post in 2021, it'll be hard for the newcomers to take the limelight away from long-loved festive favorites as only three of the most popular 20 holiday songs were released this century.
Do you have a story Newsweek should be covering? Do you have any questions about this story? Contact LiveNews@newsweek.com.
English (US) ·