Day 20 of the Underplayed Christmas Carol Advent Calendar 2025. We see a pic from the Island of misfits toys from the Rankin/Bass claymation holiday special “Santa Clause is Coming to town” with Misfit band action figures added, and a Misfits skull logo on the Jack in the Box misfit toy. There’s also the controversial Penguin happy meal toy from Batman Returns added by the Jack-in-the-Box. There’s also a Lego Shiva the chawennie, and a Lego depiction of 45 Grave next to a Snow Miser and Heat Miser figurine toy, as they provide a bonus cover of another Rankin/Bass track from The Year Without a Santa Clause.
The Misfits, an American punk rock band, have some of the most iconic iconography since the Grateful Dead; rock and roll aficionados recognized the Misfits as pioneers of the horror punk subgenre, blending punk and other musical influences with horror film themes and imagery. The group was formed in 1977 in Lodi, New Jersey, by vocalist, songwriter, and keyboardist Glenn Danzig.
45 Grave had a lesser-known career than the Misfits, acolytes and first followers of the horror punk genre, forming in 1979 and disbanding in 1985 until reformed by lead singer Dinah Cancer, operating continually again since 2005. A seminal LA Punk band, regardless of subgenre, they also have more California in their sound, making them also proto-Beach Goth, just preceded by the Doors. Jim Morrison’s associated hippie imagery may not seem Beach Goth, save the black leather holding in his lizard king, but they provided the blueprint with songs like the Ghost Song, their cover of Bertolt Brecht’s “Alabama Song” (3 Penny Opera), “the Unknown Soldier,” “Ship of Fools,” and “Light my Fire.” Jim Morrison evoke fatalism and his early death providing Paris with its most visited attraction for some years, make them important prior-art. 45 Grave perhaps greatest cultural impact came from the use of “(It’s) Party Time” on the soundtrack for my Letterbox top 4 film “The Return of the Living Dead.”
Day 20
Main pick:
The Island of Misfit Toys, covered fittingly by the Misfits.
youtu.be/Q7gn47Qccvo
Bonus:
The Snow Miser song by 45 Grave
youtu.be/zz7KTvkcFlA
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