"December" is a song from Scottish-Irish folk rock band The Waterboys, which was released in 1983 as the second and final single from their debut studio album The Waterboys. The song was written and produced by Mike Scott, with additional production by Rupert Hine. A music video was filmed to promote the single. Background "December" was written in Ayr, Scotland, and recorded at Redshop in December 1981 and Farmyard in June 1982. It was one of the first songs recorded by Scott for what went on to become the Waterboys. At the time, Scott was a member of the band Funhouse and wished to leave and pursue a new musical path. He recorded three of his own tracks at Redshop in December 1981, including "December", with the engineer Jim Preen. Using pre-recorded drum loops available at the studio, Scott performed all instrumentation himself. Scott revealed to Sounds in 1983, "'December' was done in an eight track studio. It was just a Linn drum track and I played guitar and piano over the top and sang. There's no bass guitar on it, just the bottom end of the piano. That's all there is, yet it sounds massive because we mixed it using a 24 track studio." Scott recorded the song's rhythm and two lead parts using his Danelectro "Bellzouki" 12-string guitar. In his autobiography, he said of the song's recording process with the guitar, "I laid it down in about thirty minutes - seven minutes for each overdub, and just about time to breathe in between. As the multiple-Bellzouki sound took shape, I was astonished at its breadth, and also at my own playing: the Bellzouki had inspired me beyond my limits, and the sound of my inner imagination was coming out of a pair of speaks in front of me." Additional recording on the track was carried out at Farmyard Studios in June 1982, with Rupert Hine providing additional production. Critical reception On its release as a single, Betty Page of Record Mirror commented, "Whimper, whimper. This week's 90th moody, tremulous ballad with lashings of tearful vibrato and acoustic twelve-strings. A record to sit down and listen to as the leaves fall, it informs us that 'December is the cool month'. Oh really?" Barney Hoskyns of New Musical Express gave the single a rating of six out of ten. He described it as a "big acoustic anatomy of melancholy" and