25 festive pop songs perfect for your holiday playlist

“Where Are You, Christmas?” – Faith Hill

Here’s a song you might recognize from a certain holiday movie! Faith Hill’s “Where Are You Christmas?” was released in 2000 for the film How the Grinch Stole Christmas. In the film, a snippet is performed by little Cindy Lou Who (played by a young Taylor Momsen, who now prefers to rock out on stage with her band The Pretty Reckless), but the full version appears during the credits and on the film’s soundtrack.

There’s a reason this song resonates so well and that’s because it was written by none other than the Queen of Christmas herself! Mariah Carey co-wrote “Where Are You, Christmas?” and recorded the track, but because of a legal case with her ex-husband and former Sony music exec, she couldn’t release it and it was scrapped. Her version has never been heard, but can you imagine how amazing it would be?

That’s not to say Faith Hill’s version isn’t amazing; it’s a classic after all. The song has more of an overall sad vibe to it, about how the magic of Christmas starts to disappear as you get older. It’s kind of refreshing, because Christmas isn’t necessarily a happy time for everyone, but this power ballad will still help inspire some Christmas cheer in you.

The song is one of the best-selling holiday songs of all-time according to Nielsen SoundScan, and was even covered by Pentatonix for their 2018 holiday album Christmas Is Here!