On the December 18th episode of Lily Allen and Miquita Oliver’s biweekly podcast, Miss Me?, Oliver perspicaciously mentions, “There is a part of Christmas that can make you feel sick. How you feel, like, in the weird week between Christmas and New Year.” “The gooch,” Allen chimes in. “What’s the gooch?” Oliver replies in that innocent, what-are-you-talking-about kind of way. “That’s the time between Christmas and New Year,” Allen explains matter-of-factly. “I call it the weird week. You call it the gooch?”
Yes, Allen does, describing how “Christmas is the vagina and New Year is the bum” in that metaphor. A metaphor that Sabrina Carpenter was already speaking to in 2023 with “is it new years yet?” And while she might have been talking about what Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s would deem the “mean reds” (that have their own particular kind of intensity during the month of December), she is also speaking to the “weirdness” of the “Christmas gooch” period that tends to make one who is already prone to bitterness become even bitterer than usual (see also: the Grinch).
Though, of course, Carpenter herself has no reason to be bitter—not for career reasons, anyway. For, in addition to 2024 being the year that she “blew up” in the mainstream (à la Charli XCX and Chappell Roan), her ramped-up success—complete with dating an A-list Irishman (however ephemerally), releasing her sixth album, Short n’ Sweet, and embarking on a world tour to promote the latter—led to her Christmas EP, Fruitcake, garnering even more interest since it first came out in 2023.
And it didn’t hurt for the holiday-themed album to be buttressed by a Christmas special called A Nonsense Christmas with Sabrina Carpenter, spurring sales of the six-track offering to surge this year. Carpenter reminded viewers why as she gave “live performance attention” to almost every song from the EP during her musical variety show. Except, unfortunately, “is it new years yet?” For it’s the song that speaks most candidly to what the holidays increasingly represent for the majority people: hell on Earth (granted, that’s America most of the time).
Alas, it’s likely that, due to wanting to remain somewhat “family-friendly” for the Netflix-sanctioned special, Carpenter shied away from a song that treats Christmas (and the month of December in general) so “negatively.” That is to say, honestly. Speaking to the type of gatherings that make for nothing but awkwardness and unpleasantness—particularly for those with Trump-supporting relatives—Carpenter opens the track with the blunt statement, “I’m sick and tired of this holiday/Not good at being present anyway/The songs are catchy, but they’re overplayed [that means yours, Mariah Carey]/My relatives always know what to say to piss me off.”
And it’s true, no one knows how to push buttons like a relative who’s had the benefit of studying you all your life to know which weaknesses and vulnerabilities to tap into so as to dig the knife in when it suits them (this usually applies, most of all, to siblings). Then there is the added sting of how Christmas is a time of year when togetherness both familial and romantic is foisted upon the masses. Thus, if you’re lacking in one of those “love departments,” December puts it all in much sharper focus. Compounded by being with family members who have their lives “sorted” in the traditional sense—which means being married, having kids and “owning” a home (even if paid for in monthly installments ad infinitum).
So it is that Carpenter continues to paint the picture of this “unique” time of year by singing in her chirpy signature, “Small talk in the kitchen/Dated, dumb traditions/Who sucks, competition/Call it pessimism/December is a prison/And it just makes me miss him.” That last line takes us back to the main point—that loneliness and unrequited love comes to the emotional fore during the holiday season. Carpenter, thus, secures herself as one of the only mainstream singers to acknowledge the horrors of Christmas.
Produced by John Ryan, the upbeat tempo of the track belies Carpenter’s contempt for the holiday season as she adds, “Is it New Year’s yet?/I’m getting bored, so can we skip ahead?” (a sentiment tailor-made for the attention span of the “TikTok generation”). This in addition to, “Couples all around me, damn, it hurts/Wanna push ‘em in the fireplace and watch ‘em burn.” Such a graphic kill fantasy for a pop song, n’est-ce pas? And one that many a “single” like Carpenter starts to feel more palpably with the barrage of couples putting themselves on blast around Christmastime, particularly via social media.
Worst of all, the tendency of couples to post engagement/“he proposed!” photos during this month of the year. Not that there’s anything “wrong,” per se, with being a couple (apart from its fortification of capitalism)—it just happens to serve as salt in the wound for the single person who never said they had embraced sologamy (as Carrie Bradshaw claimed to in the season six Sex and the City episode, “A Woman’s Right to Shoes”). Which, of course, applies to “couple-ready” Carpenter (whose curse of being a Taurus also condemns her to a perennial desire for monogamy).
Regrettably, she seems to be on Santa’s shit list on a lifelong basis, prompting her to ask (with a flourish that’s typical of Taurean vanity), “Santa, Santa/Why do you hate me?/I’m a gift, look how God made me.” But as many a good-looking person can attest, it’s not easy finagle a relationship just because you’re hot. In fact, that often makes it all the more difficult to “align yourself” with someone. In large part because your hotness makes you seem “unapproachable”—and like you would probably already have a significant other anyway. But not Carpenter, and not during the holidays.
So it is that she laments, “Never, never get what’s on my list/Fruitcake just makes me sick” (at last, a callout to the album’s title). As does the “Christmas gooch” “era” in general. A feeling that Carpenter isn’t alone in.
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