What The Hey? Christmas Edition, or, Out of the Blue and Into the Black : The Saga Continues

Can someone please explain to me what could possibly have possessed first-generation punk rockers Siouxie and the Banshees to cause them to record a Christmas carol? And to play it more or less straight? The band looks a little bored, I'll grant, and the guy with the drum (Budgie, was it? I didn't really follow punk back in the '80's) rolls his eyes a couple of times. But then they haven't got a lot to do as it seems the vocals are all Siouxie overlaid over Siouxie over Siouxie. She sings it well, too, though it would have been nicer if she had sung more than the first verse over and over. Anyhoo, here they are in all their nihilistic splendor:


The Lord really does move in mysterious ways.

I'd been entertaining thoughts of posting some interesting Christmas music over the next week, though this really wasn't the direction I had in mind. The fact is, there were any number of kids' choirs (even the requisite '60's French pop singer) over on YouTube who performed the song with far more charm and poignancy (probably reverence, too, though no one ever knows for sure.) It does sort of tie in with D's post on musical acts one would never expect to record Christmas music (what's next? The Sex Pistols covering Sleigh Ride? previously unreleased tracks of Iggy Popp doing Andy Williams tunes? A Kulture Klub Kristmas?) So because of that and just because it's the sort of thing that piques my curiosity, this ended up being the kick-off post. I expect to be going in a more traditional direction hereafter.

Though if a grainy video of Boy George belting out the Boar's Head Carol surfaces somewhere on the 'Net, I could change my mind...