Music

Long-reviled ‘Baby, It’s Cold Outside’ gets an update

The holiday season always brings an onslaught of gnawingly awful Christmas songs, but few can compare with the horror of “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.”

More than 70 years after it was written, the call-and-response track has become ingrained into pop culture. But take a close listen to the flirty, lyrical back-and-forth, and you’ll hear what essentially sounds like a developing date rape: The male vocal repeatedly insists that his companion stay with him, even as the female protagonist protests that “the answer is no” and, at one point, wonders if her drink has been spiked. If ever there was a song that needed a rewrite to reflect social changes, it’s this one.

Now, two Minneapolis musicians have done just that.

In late November, Lydia Liza, 22, and Josiah Lemanski, 25, spent a mere hour writing and recording a new version of the classic that tones down the coercive creep factor. Instead of persisting with his aggressive pleas, the male singer backs off — and the couple plans to meet again at the Cheesecake Factory. As for what’s in her drink, it’s “pomegranate LaCroix” sparkling water.

In one week, the song was played more than 350,000 times on SoundCloud.

Zooey Deschanel and Will Ferrell sing “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” in the 2003 film “Elf.”Everett Collection

The song was composed in 1944 by Frank Loesser (who would go on to write the music for “Guys and Dolls”). In the original score, the predatory subtext of the song was underlined by the fact that the male character was described as “wolf” and the female as “mouse.”

To this day, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” gets covered regularly. Zooey Deschanel sang it in both the 2003 movie “Elf” and on a 2011 album with her band She & Him. Rod Stewart teamed up with Dolly Parton for a version in 2004 and, last year, Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga sang the song in a Barnes & Noble commercial. This year brings us a version with Brett Eldredge and Meghan Trainor — ironic given Trainor hit the charts this year with “No,” which centered on resisting aggressive and inappropriate male attention.

Liza and Lemanski’s version has attracted enough buzz to earn a full release next Friday via the Minneapolis-based Rock the Cause label, with plans being made for the proceeds to go to various women’s charities.

It also has touched scores of listeners.

“We’ve had tons of people reaching out who are sexual-assault survivors,” Liza says. “Another woman messaged us to say it helped open up a conversation with her daughters [about consent]. That kind of thing is really beautiful.”