It's that time of year again - time to remind you that A New Pair Of Socks exists

[Skankindead]

Yes, while you may be familiar with the classic Chris Squire Christmas tune Run With The Fox, and maybe its B-side Return Of The Fox, less people may be familiar with the clearly improved and re-lyric'd version A New Pair Of Socks - with vocals by Chris himself. Its origin is shrouded in mystery, but from what I've heard it was done for one of Rick Wakeman's radio shows and the lyrics were done by a fan. Not sure where this information comes from and I can't confirm if it's true, but whatever happened, it lead to this banger of a song.

What do you think? Better, worse, or about the same quality as the original?

[Gilly Goodness]

Oh Ski-daddle, it's all true. Our very own Inveryes was the fan. The redoubtable wee Scot. And the new lyrics are very clever.


PROGIFY EVERYTHING

[Ceasar’s Palace]

Weird Al Yankovich couldn’t have done a better job!

[Yorkshire Square]

Will you please bugger off!

It's only the 2nd December and I've already had to suffer Noddy bloody Holder on the radio... 🙄🙄

[Skankindead]

Haha, I'd never actually heard the song you're talking about until you mentioned it. I live in the US and Slade never made it big over here, so Merry Xmas Everybody never gets played on the radio. Not sure I'd want it played all that much - but hopefully we can agree that Run With The Fox at least should be a Christmas classic over it.

[Ash Armstrong]

Bah! Humbuggery!

[ragtime]

The self-parody of Run With The Fox is great! Good find.

Personally, I love real Christmas ( December 24/5 - January 6) but can't be doing with the 'it's just another name for December, or anytime after Halloween' commercial nonsense we have now. And I agree that that Slade song got old some 40 years ago, so it's high time it was put to rest

[Gilly Goodness]

We don't get Slade down here. But wall to wall Mariah Carey doing her song All I Want... etc. Mariah, you ain't on fire!



ELECTRIFY EVERYTHING

[luna65]

It's such a fun version, cheers to Inveryes for coming up with the new lyrics.

[Slugwart]

Tacky Christmas song Aussie style.

[Gary Betts]

I seem to remember that a fan wrote the lyrics as a bit of fun and posted them onto Yesfans. Chris found out and decided to record them. I found it a mark of the man that he didn't take himself too seriously and gave to the fans.

[Khatrooper]

It is worth the extra mention, but my OCD would like to point out that the forum owner beat you to it, and the lyricist is credited, see thread

https://www.thenewyesfans.com/forum/main-forum/current-yes-lineup/jon-davison/200-run-with-the-fox#post223

[Grey Wolf]

InverYes posted the story on the Old Yesfans, I hope he can post it here too.

[Inveryes]

Guilty as charged!

I had listened to Run With The Fox on the way into work in the car and, it being a quiet day, wrote the new lyrics. I posted them on Yesfans, with apologies to Chris of course. I then got a message pop-up from Scotty. I thought I must have upset the big man, but it turned out the message was to phone Chris. For those of you who have met the band in person multiple times this wouldn’t mean much, but to me it was a daunting prospect! It’s Chris Squire ffs! Anyway, I spent ages plucking up the courage to give him a phone.

Turns out he asked if it was OK with me if he used the lyrics to record them for his appearance on Rick's internet radio show in a few days’ time. I said yes!

He recorded it over the instrumental version of Run With The Fox and I'm told it became a regular Christmas tune in the Squire household.
I’ve got a recording of Chris telling the story on Rick’s Planet Rock show.

I also believe, although I haven't seen it myself, that the song is now officially credited to Chris, Alan and myself. (I’d love to see that in print if any musicians on here can access it)

All good fun!

[Skankindead]

Guilty as charged!

The man, the myth, the legend himself!

It's incredibly interesting to hear the story from your perspective. I hadn't actually realized you'd joined this forum - in fact I didn't know you wrote it until a few days ago. It's also very fascinating to hear about all the crazy things that happened on the forum - getting your parody lyrics read by Chris Squire is no small feat! (And getting to have met him makes me extremely jealous lol). That song's been a classic on the Yes Discord server I frequent ever since we found out about it - it really is a pity only around 3,000 people have seen it on Youtube. It truly is a Christmas classic, up there with Jingle Bells and the theme song from Santa Claus Conquers The Martians.

If you could send that recording (if you're allowed to, if not that's fine) that'd be epic.