When you listen to it, I guarantee you’ll have two immediate thoughts: 1. This song rules – clearly Smash Mouth are the poet laureates of a generation, and 2. How on Earth was this absolute banger left off the soundtrack to the 2007 DreamWorks Christmas special Shrek The Halls?
Baggage Claim is a delicious slice of alt-rock pudding, a Christmas tune for a generation raised in the post-punk revival, falling somewhere in the delightful morass of mid-2000s rock between Blink-182, Modest Mouse and early Arctic Monkeys.
Over a propulsive, ever-so-slightly-distorted riff, lead singer Steve Harwell (R.I.P) relays the all-too-relatable story of picking up a loved one from the airport just in time for Christmas, driving around the old neighbourhood and reminiscing on holiday memories. An exercise in simple, evocative storytelling, it’s nostalgic and hopeful and surprisingly poetic.
Lines like “Never saw Santa Claus’ face/ Apartment’s got no fireplace” conjure memories of whispering conspiratorially with siblings as you wait for Santa to arrive and falling asleep every time. Others, like “A jet plane ain’t no Christmas sleigh/ And the pilot’s beard ain’t long or grey”, will resonate with anyone whose family has scattered in adulthood and where catch-ups are joyful but regretfully sparse. “Saint Somebody’s bells are ringing/ And I hear a Christmas movie through the ceiling”, Harwell sings, as your body fills with the spirit of the season and your Hawaiian shirt grows three sizes that day.
It packs a heck of a chorus, too, as rousing as Santa Claus is Coming to Town, as resounding as Last Christmas, and as catchy as Jingle Bell Rock. It’ll rattle around your head like the train set your fun uncle promised you back in the day.
So if you’re looking for a new Christmas banger to add to your rotation, one that won’t make you want to stuff your ears with cranberry sauce, give Baggage Claim a whirl. And hey, maybe one of these days they’ll bring out a sequel to Shrek the Halls and we’ll get a Smash Mouth-flavoured Christmas miracle.
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