Mariah Carey Proves the Christmas Creep Is Real

'All I Want for Christmas Is You' has already cracked Billboard Hot 100
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 29, 2018 9:15 AM CST
Mariah Carey Proves Christmas Keeps Coming Earlier
Mariah Carey poses at the American Music Awards in Los Angeles on Oct. 9, 2018.   (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

It's Nov. 29. If you've already had enough of the decorations and Christmas music, it's possible you're not a Scrooge—you're just suffering from overexposure. The "Christmas creep" appears to have begun earlier than usual this year, if Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" is an accurate metric. The Washington Post tracked Google search interest in the 1994 hit, finding it's currently "trending well ahead of prior years." As for those prior years, a look at search behavior since 2006 shows the upward trend begins in mid-September (yes, really), sees a significant jump around Halloween, and gets another big boost in mid-November. Quartz found something similar in analyzing the song's annual reappearance on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, which ranks the week's most popular songs.

Since Billboard allowed older songs to reenter the charts in 2012, the popular tune has premiered slightly earlier with each holiday season. This year, it premiered more than a week earlier than in 2017, hitting No. 29 during the week of Nov. 16-22. Last year, the song hit the charts in the week of Dec. 1-7, a full week earlier than it did in 2012. "Before we know it, 'All I Want for Christmas is You' will be the song of summer," Quartz quips, though you aren't likely to hear Carey complaining. She's already nabbed $60 million in royalties from "All I Want for Christmas Is You"—also the title of her latest holiday-themed tour across Europe, per Bustle—and turned her 7-year-old twins into apparent fans. They sing background vocals on the song in a video shared by Carey on Wednesday, per HuffPo. (More Christmas stories.)

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