7 O'Clock News/Silent Night
"7 O'Clock News/Silent Night" is a song by American music duo Simon & Garfunkel from their third studio album, "Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme" (1966). The track is sound collage juxtaposing a rendition of the Christmas carol "Silent Night" with a simulated "7 O'Clock News" bulletin consisting of actual events from the summer of 1966. Composition. The track is a sound collage and simply constructed: it consists of the duo singing "Silent Night" two-part harmony over an arpeggiated piano section. The voice of the newscaster is that of Charlie O'Donnell, who was then a  radio disc jockey. As the track progresses, the news report assumes a greater presence through an increase in volume. "The result rather bluntly makes an ironic commentary on various social ills by juxtaposing them with tenderly expressed Christmas sentiments." The mix on the track purposefully clashes with the piano accompaniment mixed solely to the left channel and the news solely to the right channel while vocals remain in the middle. The following events are reported in the order given: Cover. Phoebe Bridgers released a cover version of this song in 2019. The song featured Bridgers and Fiona Apple singing over  a different news report read by Matt Berninger. The news featured the announcement of a settlement that would not force the Sackler family, owners of Purdue Pharma, to admit wrongdoing in the deaths of hundreds of thousands related to their opioid products, the first all female spacewalk, the murder of Botham Jean, the supreme court hearing the case of a restrictive abortion law and the testimony of Mick Mulvaney in the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump.