Underneath the Tree · Tesla Light Show
by Kelly Clarkson
A wall of sleigh bells from the first bar, and the show matches the wattage: driving pulses through the verses, full-body flares on each chorus, and the sax solo gets its own strut across the front. Clarkson and Greg Kurstin built it as a deliberate answer to Mariah, and it earns the comparison. The cues are spaced more deliberately than the energy suggests, and only about an eighth of the values sit at a partial level, so those flares are hard-edged rather than soft. Tail-led, peaking in the middle. Modern Christmas at maximum brightness.
How this one is choreographed
The choreography is deliberately unhurried: the lights re-fire about 0.6 times a second, so cues land as separate moments rather than a blur. The peak is in the middle third, where roughly 34% of the car is lit against 33% at the top, then it eases back for the finish. The fullest ten seconds come early, starting at 0:05 with about 38% of the car lit, so have people watching from the first bar. Most of the work falls on the tail lights, re-firing about 0.7 times a second, with the signature light bar and daytime running lights answering back at 0.6. The work is split close to evenly between the two ends, 51% front to 49% rear, so it plays from either end, or side-on from the curb. The quietest part of the car is the rear turn signals, at about 0.4 re-fires a second. It runs 3:47 and averages 76 of 255 across the light channels, a mid-brightness show, with real headroom kept in reserve for the peaks. The values are mostly hard on or hard off, only about 13% of samples sitting at a partial level, which reads sharp and percussive from across a parking lot. It never goes completely dark for long: the longest gap is 0.3 of a second, at 0:00.
Measured from the exported light sequence for this show, not estimated from the song.
Get it for your Tesla
This show downloads for every Tesla: Model 3, Model Y, Model S, Model X, and Cybertruck. Preview it on your model with the View-on picker above, add it to your library, and it re-tailors to your car's lights automatically.
How to play it on your car
- Open the show above and add it to your library (remix it in the builder first if you want).
- Add your own copy of the song: an MP3/WAV you own. We distribute only the light pattern, never audio.
- Export the
.fseqbuilt for your model, then place your song next to it (or let the one-click USB writer do both). - Put both files in a
LightShowfolder on a USB drive. Or skip the manual steps: in Chrome/Edge, click 🔌 Write it to my USB drive for me right after exporting and we do it all, verified byte-for-byte. Then plug in and start it from Toybox → Light Show. Full walkthrough in the setup guide.
Car says Light Show instead of Custom Light Show, or the drive is not detected at all? That is the USB format, the folder name, or filenames that do not match. If it plays but drifts out of time, that is the audio sample rate. Fix both here.
Setting up for Christmas? The Christmas guide walks through the whole evening, from picking the show to parking the car so the neighbours can actually see it. Read the Christmas guide.
