Song of the Week – ’70s Stoner Christmas Comedy

Ignored            Obscured             Restored

Today’s SotW has very little actual music.  Instead, it brings some levity to the holiday with a few bits of ‘70s stoner Christmas comedy.  Who even knew that was a thing!?!

Let’s start with my favorite comedy troupe of all time, The Firesign Theatre.

Only the Firesign would use a Christmas hymn (The First Noel) as a vehicle for their absurdist humor.

“Toad Away” was the lead track from Dear Friends (1972).  Dear Friends was a compilation of routines that the Firesign recorded from the radio show they had on KPFK in Los Angeles, from September 1970 to February 1971.

Who better represents ‘70s stoner humor than Cheech & Chong?  Their first release on a single was their holiday bit, “Santa Claus and His Old Lady” (1971).

Aside from the politically incorrect references to Santa’s wife as his “old lady” and the elves as midgets, this is still a pretty entertaining story.  The part where Santa gets held up at the border shows that things haven’t changed much in 50 years.

I first discovered “Santa Doesn’t Cop Out on Dope” (1972) on the Warner Brothers Loss Leader album All Singing – All Talking – All Rocking (1975).  Do you remember those terrific samplers?

“Santa Doesn’t Cop Out…” is typical snarky Martin Mull humor.  It was later covered by Sonic Youth for the Christmas compilation Just Say Noel (1976).

Now I’m primed to hit the spiked eggnog.  Merry Christmas!

Enjoy… until next week.

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