Favorite Holiday Song Winner! The Waitresses:Christmas Wrapping" (1981)

Congratulations Moira Littlethorn for coming up with our Favorite Holiday Song selection. We had some great entries (thanks Lou and Barbara etc.)

According to Hardcafe.co.uk, The Waitresses started life in Akron, Ohio possibly as a joke by Chris Butler who had previously (or possibly concurrently) been in the band Tin Huey. When most of the band moved to New York, they were joined by ex Television drummer Billy Ficca and signed to New York label ZE (probably most famous for it's nurturing of Kid Creole and the Coconuts) in 1981. Probably the most unusual aspect of the songs on the first LP, "Wasn't Tomorrow Wonderful?" was that despite being written by Butler, were all seen from the womans perspective. The band was fronted by Patty Donohue, who also called herself Patty Darling. Several sources state that the songs were about Patty Darling as a fictional character, but there were many similarities to Donohue as well.

The Waitresses first album got a little traction on the New Wave scene in the U.S. especially in the NYC area, where they got a lot of airplay. The biggest song was "I Know What Boys Like" which was recorded by Butler where he played all of the instruments and invited friend Patty Donohue to do the vocals. A band was hastily put together after a label showed interest. It charted in Australia and got airplay in England as well. The song would be covered in 1987 by The Bouncing Souls from New Brunswick, New Jersey with a male lead to poke fun at homophobia. It would be covered in a Glee CD as well.

"Christmas Wrapping" was not on any of their releases, but came out on a Ze compilation record called "A Christmas Record." The song would become a fcult favorite and is in a lot of X-mas top ten lists on the net. Many people have told me that this is one of their all-time favorites.

According to Jeff Blocker at Cult of Jef: "In August of 1981, the band was tour­ing bars, col­leges, and clubs, try­ing to make a dent in the charts with “I Know What Boys Like,” when  ZE Records, asked them to record a Christ­mas song for a com­pi­la­tion enti­tled "A Christ­mas Record".  Band founder Chris But­ler hated Christ­mas at the time, but man­aged to weave together dif­fer­ent pieces of songs he had pre­vi­ously com­posed, and fin­ished the lyrics on the taxi ride to the stu­dio.  The band recorded the “Christ­mas Wrap­ping” in two days and went back on the road.

But­ler had for­got­ten about the song until his girl­friend called him and said the Wait­resses’ song was finally receiv­ing air­play.  How­ever, it wasn’t “I Know What Boys Like,” it was “Christ­mas Wrap­ping.”  The band ended up play­ing the song through June to pro­mote their album.

The song describes a young woman who meets a young man in a ski shop.  They exchange tele­phone num­bers and attempt to get together through­out the year, but some­thing always seems to hap­pen.  Patty Don­ahue sing-speaks the song with impec­ca­ble  tim­ing, which leads to a fun, happy end­ing."

"Bah, humbug!" No, that's too strong 
'Cause it is my favorite holiday 
But all this year's been a busy blur 
Don't think I have the energy

To add to my already mad rush 
Just 'cause it's 'tis the season. 
The perfect gift for me would be 
Completions and connections left from

Last year, ski shop, 
Encounter, most interesting. 
Had his number but never the time 
Most of '81 passed along those lines.

The Donnas would cover the song as would many others. 

 

As for The Waitresses, the band would bust up during the recording of their second albul "bruiseology". Chris Butler would go on to produce records and bass player Tracy Wormworth would play with the B52's, Sting and Rosie O'Donnell's house band.

 

Patty Donohue became a talent rep. A heavy smoker, she sadly died of lung cancer at age fourty.

 

Interestingly, none of there albums were ever released in CD format.