Fiona Apple Performs Her Disquieting Trump-Themed “Christmas Song” Live

Share:

Last night, Fiona Apple performed at the Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles for the We Rock with Standing Rock concert (a benefit event for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe), along with other artists including TV on the Radio, Sky Ferreira, Moses Sumney, and Devendra Banhart. Today, footage of Apple’s performance of a recently-released song showed up on Youtube.

You can watch the first live version of her disquieting, seethingly-sung Trump-themed “The Christmas Song” (“Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire,” reimagined as “Trump’s Nuts Roasting on an Open Fire”) below. (The video was spotted by Pitchfork.)

As Rolling Stone points out, this live version featured backing arrangements, while the original video, shared earlier this month, was sung a cappella (and in menacing close-up.)

“Everybody knows some money and entitlement/ Can help to make the season white/Mothers of color with their kids out of sight/ Will find it hard to sleep at night,” she quivers and softly rages over the familiar tune, before finishing out the track with a roaring “fuck you” to the President Elect.

Watch: