Why Does Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ Get More Popular Every Year?
Through sheer determination (and memes) Carey has turned a 26-year-old song into an annual tradition.
On November 1 each year, Mariah Carey takes to the internet to declare: “It’s time”.
The undisputed queen of Christmas has become the official starting gun of the season. It’s a sign that it’s time to get festive and, more importantly, to hit play on ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’, her 26 year-old anthem that continues to grow in popularity.
At the time of writing, a few weeks out from Christmas, the song sits at number two on Spotify’s global streaming chart, clocking over four million plays a day. As November came to a close, it was outperforming its 2019 numbers by more than 400,000 a day in the US. It’s impressive, given that last year it hit number 1 for the first time on the Billboard Hot 100 and broke Spotify’s global streaming record by raking in 12 million plays on Christmas day.
If the trajectory of ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ continues, it’s likely 2020 will be its biggest year yet, and Carey is certainly doing everything to make sure of it. She’s delivered a Christmas special for Apple Music, closing it with the iconic song. In interviews for the special, conversation revolves around her 1994 classic and how she’s turned it into a modern classic.
It’s been a slow grind for the track, which has gone through plenty of peaks and troughs in its ascent to the top. Carey generally steers away from discussing marketing tactics, but her and her team hit their stride in the latter part of the last decade, embracing its newfound streaming fame and leaning into the internet culture that fuels the song.
All I Want For Christmas Is An Original Christmas Pop Song
Twenty six years ago, Carey was one of the most promising new artists around. She had released three acclaimed albums and collected eight number one singles in the US. When her label raised the idea of a Christmas album with her, Carey was rightfully hesitant.
“I felt like, don’t people usually do that later on in their career,” she revealed in a 2019 Amazon documentary, later telling Complex that “a Christmas album is usually the end [of an artists career].”
“A Christmas album is usually the end [of an artists career].”
Despite her hesitation she agreed to do it, but not quite in the way her label imagined. Randy Jackson, A&R at her label of the time Columbia Records, told Amazon, “The idea was let’s just do a bunch of covers that are public domain. And she was like, ‘but I wanna write some new ones.’”
Inspired by a dysfunctional childhood that often saw Christmas ruined, Carey set out to “write a song that would make me happy and make me feel like a loved, carefree young girl at Christmas,” as she writes in her 2020 memoir The Meaning Of Mariah.
The song was the lead-single of 1994’s Merry Christmas, an album that featured three originals alongside holiday standards like ‘O Holy Night’ and ‘Joy To The World’. It was a moderate success for Carey, becoming the second-highest selling holiday album of the year in the US.
‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ peaked at number two in Australia but was ineligible for the US charts as it wasn’t released commercially as a physical single.
Each year the song garnered airplay in December — but its popularity flatlined after its release as it failed to reach any great heights. In 2000, Billboard changed their chart rules about physical releases, allowing the song to chart at number 84. It fell off once again, however, leaving it until more than a decade later to reach the top 30.
All I Want For Christmas Is Love, Actually
In 2003, the song was brought firmly back into the spotlight when it was featured in the film Love, Actually. It’s used in a climatic moment when Olivia Olsen, playing 10 year-old student Joanna, sings it at the school Christmas party, backed by a lovelorn Sam on drums.
“The curious thing about that is that [the movie] happened before the song was as big as it is,” Carey told Billboard last year. “The Love, Actually moment, I’m actually very grateful for it because I think it did help the song reach an even greater audience.”
According to co-writer Walter Afanasieff, Carey rarely allows for her songs to be used in movies but, “she liked the script and she liked the actors,” so she said yes.
A classic isn’t born overnight and just like ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’, it’s taken years for Love, Actually to become a holiday tradition. But over time, the two have assisted each other in their quest for Christmas domination.
All I Want For Christmas Is A Remix
Carey has fiddled with the song on numerous occasions over the years. In 2000, she dropped the ‘So So Def Remix’ with Jermaine Dupri and Bow Wow, including it as a bonus track on her Greatest Hits release.
In 2009, she released ‘Mariah’s New Dance Remix’ with Low Sunday. The biggest redo, however, came in 2010 when she unveiled her second Christmas album Merry Christmas II You including a new version of ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ with Justin Bieber. It reached number 86 in the US, but ultimately failed to outshine the original.
After Merry Christmas II You it seemed like Carey’s Christmas tactic changed. She stopped playing with the original and started capitalising on what was already there. She adapted it into a children’s book of the same name and then turned it into an animated Christmas film. All the while, she began to put on decadent Christmas performances.
Beginning 2014, she started a tradition of live holiday concerts. They started out as a residency at the Beacon Theatre in New York called ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You: A Night of Joy and Festivity’. In 2017, she took it to Las Vegas and Europe and last year, she finished up at Madison Square Garden.
Despite never performing the song on television in the ‘90s, she appeared 15 times in the 2000s to promote it, establishing her Christmas presence bit-by-bit. She’s performed it with Michael Bublé, sung it with James Corden on ‘Carpool Karaoke’ and became a regular at the Rockefeller Centre Tree Lighting in New York. Bit-by-bit its Christmas presence has become ubiquitous.
All I Want For Christmas Is A Meme
That presence has never been more powerful than it is right now. According to The New York Times, it was streamed about 12.6 million times through November and December in 2014 as streaming began to make impact. In 2016, that number had jumped to 61 million which was by far eclipsed by 185 million streams last year. Early indicators suggest this year will topple the last. It’s not just a classic right now, it’s a viral hit.
Carey has often referred to herself as the “elusive chanteuse”. She was notoriously difficult to pin down for interviews and was often guarded on social media. In recent years, however, she’s embraced it giving playful snapshots into her glamorous life and interacting with fans.
Last year, her fans sent the soundtrack to her panned 2001 film Glitter to number one on iTunes. Carey embraced it, replying to fans on Twitter and promoting #JusticeForGlitter. She also referenced a meme that pictured her riding on a New York subway in a blue ball gown in her 2019 video for ‘A No No’.
She’s leaned heavily into the meme culture surrounding the track. Since 2018, she’s been declaring the beginning of Christmas on 1st November, playfully noting the transition from Halloween to the holidays. In the days leading up to it she toys with fans telling them, “not yet”.
“You have to embrace it,” she told Pitchfork last year when asked whether she sees the memes about her.
By assuming her position as the official starter of Christmas, she’s giving ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ a headstart. While other Christmas songs have only been impacting the charts in the last fortnight, Carey’s has been climbing streaming charts since early November.
Carey has completely embraced the internet’s growing adoration of the track — and each season, she blesses us with a little something extra to keep the Christmas spirit alive. Last year, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the song, she delivered an expanded version of Merry Christmas. This year, she’s teamed up with Apple for a camp Christmas special that pulls in Ariana Grande, Jennifer Hudson, Billy Eichner, Tiffany Haddish and more.
It’s a typically over-the-top affair but it represents everything a Carey Christmas is — fantastical, joyful and hopeful. No matter how hyperbolic she is with her portrayal of Christmas, you believe her. She’s one of the most grandiose, decadent stars on earth embracing a holiday that shares those attributes more so than any other.
“Christmas was always ruined for me as a kid,” Carey told EW. “That’s part of the whole drive behind this push that I have every year, of ‘what exactly are we doing to enhance this already incredible moment?’”
Sam Murphy is a music writer and Co-Editor of The Interns. Follow him on Twitter.
Photo Credit: Apple TV