WashingtonPost.com: Where are the new Christmas classics? It’s increasingly hard to write a seasonal song that becomes a standard.

By Allison Stewart December 21 at 7:20 PM

This time of year, Run-D.M.C.’s Darryl McDaniels doesn’t like to leave the house. “I’m scared to go to the mall, because every five steps somebody’s screaming, ‘It’s Christmastime in Hollis, Queens!’ Kids, grandmothers, it’s crazy,” McDaniels says. “I can’t be going shopping till after Christmas.”

Run-D.M.C.’s “Christmas in Hollis” is a modern holiday standard, making McDaniels a member of a vanishingly small club: Most lyricists of classic Christmas songs are dead. “Christmas in Hollis” was originally released in 1987, during a 10-year span that produced two other classics, Wham’s “Last Christmas” (1984) and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” (1994). There hasn’t been an enduring holiday song released in the 20 years since.

Article Source: WashingtonPost.com