I am in complete agreement about the when and how much of holiday music! Many places started here with holiday ads/décor before Halloween! Meaning, yes, that some Christmas music has been heard before November. Sigh.

Do you prefer Brenda Lee to rock you around the seasonally festooned conifer or are you more favorable to Hall & Oates doing this?

Since I happen to genuinely like holiday music, I'm okay with coming across Perry mooning on about how the holiday was when he was but a young thing. However. You're quite right that there is an abundance of overly sentimental renderings of so many songs. And they are not to be thrown at an unsuspecting public. That is not what the holiday is all about.

I shall have to disagree about the crooners, though. Beyond finding some of those older arrangements just fabulous [either sincerely, or in their overblown orchestration], I also have the history of my grandmother telling me how 'dreamy' several of them were- a sentiment she held regardless of never knowing what some of them looked like.

PS: Mariah Cary should never have been allowed to sing Christmas music of any kind, let alone record it. Ouch.