Music of the holiday season has a hard balance to strike. A certain amount of classicism is to be expected at this time of year, but that’s no excuse to pile on the gloopy garbage and think that the supposedly overweening sentimentality of the season will leave everyone crying in their eggnog anyway. Baloney. There’s a lot of joy in the holiday season, but there are a lot of other emotions. And that’s not even counting the religious aspects. The best seasonal music reflects that; the worst ignores it to lay on the glop in a display of passive aggression that, well, helps produce a lot of those other emotions.
And as usual, this year’s forced march through the holiday discs unearths examples of both extremes.
I’ll Be Home for Christmas
The Isley Brothers Featuring Ronald Isley
(Def Soul Classics)
Executive-produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, yet it begins with spring-in-your-step, lo-fi versions of “Winter Wonderland” and “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” both backed by a piano trio and a few understated strings.
Things get back into familiar Jam/Lewis territory with the originals “I’m in Love” and “What Can I Buy You?” (with the excellent autobiographical complaint “I never felt this broke being a millionaire”), with bumping drum machines and subterranean synthesizers. The majority of the record is swinging and small-band-based; the acoustic guitar-led “The Christmas Song,” featuring Doc Powell, is another highlight.
But the real selling point is the sugar-and-sandpaper classic-soul voice of Ronald Isley, still in fine form nearly 50 years removed from “Shout.” A winner.
It’s Christmas,
of Course
Darlene Love
(Shout! Factory)
Where to begin with this one?
Love, the former singer of The Crystals (“He’s a Rebel”) who has sung her classic “Christmas Baby (Please Come Home)” on David Letterman’s show for 17 years in a row, comes out with a collection of relatively new holiday rock classics, and she takes each one over. From the fun mid-tempo rock of Tom Petty’s “Christmas All Over Again” (“Long-distance relatives/ Haven’t seen ’em in a long, long time/ I kinda miss ’em/ I just don’t wanna kiss ’em”) to a sharp, cutting “Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto” (originally by James Brown) to Billy Squier’s underrated “Christmas Is the Time to Say I Love You,” Love takes control.
There’s an R&B, horn-led twist to versions of XTC’s “Thanks for Christmas” (improving on the twee original) and John and Yoko’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” and The Pretenders’ hitherto-untouchable “2000 Miles” is reborn as a Vince Guaraldi-styles piano-jazz ballad.
So where to begin with this one? The simplest way: It’s the best of the season. There, that wasn’t so hard.
Miss Patti’s Christmas
Patti Labelle
(Def Soul Classics)
Another winner from Def Soul, this time with Patti Labelle proving she’s got plenty left in the tank on a raft of classics and new tunes. The album, also executive-produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, is a bit more expensively produced than the Isleys’ record, with drum machines and pillowy strings, and a bit more explicitly religious, but it’s still got the lush feel of quiet-storm soul. Her soaring “Holidays Mean More to Me” is a highlight, and the opening original “Christmas Jam” sounds like a new-school classic.
Hell’s Bells of Christmas: The Holiday Tribute to AC/DC
The Green Days of Christmas: The Holiday Tribute to Green Day … and Christmas for All: The Holiday Tribute to Metallica
(Christmas Rock Records)
Despite the back-cover bravado (“We’ve taken rock’s biggest and baddest songs and shaped them into Christmas instrumentals that would make Irving Berlin blush”), these three discs add up to pretty tame stuff. AC/DC, Green Day and Metallica songs get more of a lounge treatment (with main melodies stated by flutes, vibes and muted trumpets) with the holiday touch provided by nonstop sleigh bells on every song.
They’re not anything you’re going to listen to more than once. They’re not anything you’re likely to listen to all the way through even once. They’re more of a joke than anything else, something to sneak onto a mix CD, or to slip on during the gift-wrapping party and have a giggle because Grandpa’s bopping his head slightly and he doesn’t know that it’s to “Call of Kthulu.” And after that, where are you? Um, listening to lounge versions of Metallica songs. Yeah, joke’s on Grandpa …
Rockabye Baby! Lullaby Renditions of Christmas Rock Classics
(Baby Rock Records)
Remember what I said before about the meager thrills to be had by knowing you’re getting Grandpa to bop his head to Metallica? Well, this stuff is even meaner (in both senses of the word) than that.
This Rockabye Baby! stuff has been crossing my desk with appalling regularity lately. These collections, particularly this holiday record, is cheaply done, dumbed-down instrumental versions of rock songs (here, holiday offerings originally by Pearl Jam, The Ramones, No Doubt and more) that seem to exist for no other reason than for anxious not-as-young-as-they-think parents to reassure themselves that they’re not like those other, uncool parents: “Hee hee! I’m playing insipid lullabyes for my baby after changing diapers and cleaning up poo all day, but MY lullabyes are actually Metallica tunes!” Cool! So freaking what?
The record at hand is particularly pointless. They’re Christmas songs! If you really want to raise your kid’s musical game, why not play the originals?
Bleah.
A Toby Keith Classic Christmas
Toby Keith
(Show Dog Nashville)
There’s not much to say about this two-disc set – if you’re a Keith fan you’re probably going to get it anyway, and if you’re not there are no revelations here.
The first disc is secular stuff such as “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” “Silver Bells” and “White Christmas,” and the second is more frankly religious material. The latter contains the highlight of the set, a rollicking, swampy gospel take on “Go Tell It On the Mountain,” but drags down with ballads. Fairly frequent dobro solos and the occasional mournful fiddle (particularly nice in “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”) are the only country touches.
Keith has one of the stronger voices in pop-country music, but he’s mostly misplaced here, lacking the vocal power to go all “O Holy Night” on us (he doesn’t do it here), but the arrangements are too ponderous for him to go with a plain-spoken Bing Crosby style. Mostly unaffecting.
A Christmas Fiesta
Jon Secada
(Big3 Records)
Secada’s offering is not Latino Christmas music, but Christmas standards done in a variety of Latino and Caribbean styles. Some (“This Christmas”) are more Latin than others (“Silver Bells”), but a pounding salsa-influenced “Winter Wonderland” is a highlight, with suitably chattering horns and percussion. “Jingle Bell Rock” starts off as a charging rock en espanol tune, but goes limp quickly. You’ll like the Afro-Caribbean groove, complete with steel pans, on “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” though.
Christmastime in Larryland
Larry the Cable Guy
(Warner Bros.)
More of the same from the proudly redneck comedian, this time in the frame of an old-time radio show. Give Santa an interminable Q&A about masturbation and reindeer poop, add some mostly lame attacks on the usual liberal strawmen — the ACLU-types who are “more afraid of Jesus than al-Qaida” and “all the political-correct [sic] stuff and the environmental tree huggers who’ve got us under their thumb,” throw in a bit about a Muslim comedian who gets booed off the stage for his joke about beheading Santa and you’ve got yourself a Christmas! Apparently!
Sure, Larry takes a few cracks at his own demographic, like in “Dysfunctional Family Christmas,” but even there it’s more mean than funny. His “Eulogy” for the guy who invented the laugh track is interesting in a meta sense, but that’s an early moment that gets wasted.
Ho: A Dan Band Christmas
The Dan Band
(Reincarnate Music)
Now, if you’re gonna take a juvenile swipe at Christmas, this is how you do it. The Dan Band puts together a genre-hopping compendium of filthy takes on the holiday ethic, and does it with virtuosity, respect for what they’re stealing from and, in the end, a little bit of heart.
They start off with the would-be arena anthem “I Wanna Rock You Hard This Christmas” and continue to the neo-soul of “Ho Ho Ho,” in which Santa gives a streetwalker the night off. The rugged radio rock of Mrs. Claus is an earnest tribute to the woman who “probably made all the damn toys anyway” (“We call him Santa and Kris/ But I don’t even know your first name”). “Christmas in California” is a deft mix of the Beach Boys on the verses and Green Day on the choruses, all with the complaints of a California transplant bemoaning the lack of the traditional cold-weather Christmas trappings.
When I got this disc, I shuddered. The only thing worse than a bunch of poorly recorded, uninspired frat-boy poop humor is a bunch of poorly recorded, uninspired frat-boy poop humor about Christmas. But The Dan Band delivers. The disc lags near the end, despite a rather skillful mix of Justin Timberlake and Meat Loaf (!) in “Not One Christmas Eve,” but it never lapses into what it threatens to be. Some of the lyrics are really (really really) not ready for the family party, but it’s got humor and heart.
A Twismas Story
Conway Twitty with Twitty Bird and Their Little Friends
No. I am not making this up. Country legend Twitty warbles through Christmas songs and hokey skits with Twitty Bird (his 11-year-old granddaughter).
Twitty does his best, in as fine voice as ever, going through classics and holiday-inspired originals like a good sport; this “musical storybook” apparently was his idea, which makes sense if you know what I mean.
This is the first time this has been available since 1994, and the first time on CD. I’m sure this is breakthrough news. If you have to pay for this, don’t even think about it. If you can listen for free, it’s essential. It’s available online through conwaytwitty.com.
Christmas Wish
Olivia Newton-John
(Compass Productions)
This is mostly a subdued, piano-driven affair, with very few tracks containing even drums, never mind electric instruments. The singer is still in fine voice, and while her choices in classics aren’t too adventurous, there are plenty of originals (written and co-written by Amy Sky) around the holiday theme that explore other than the usual stuff, such as “Every Time It Snows,” a duet with Jon Secada about the irony of heartbreak during such a traditionally happy season.
“A Mother’s Christmas Wish” isn’t too inspired, but at least offers a fresh perspective. The world-peace anthem “Underneath the Same Sky” begins to go off the rails — clinical semi-rock that telegraphs its emotional punches, and the closing “A Gift of Love,” a duet with (and written by) Barry Manilow, is schmaltzy, but “Christmas On My Radio,” a paean to holiday music, is sweet if sticky.
It’s all wrapped up in the usual shiny “Christmas-music” ballad production, but there’s plenty of fresh material for those who are ready to gag if they hear another rendition of “Frosty the Snowman.”
Christmas
Kimberley Locke
(Curb Records)
True to its generic title, the former American Idol non-winner goes through a dozen Christmas classics here without leaving a trace.
Remember how Perry Como or Donny and Marie or someone like that always had a Christmas special on TV? And they’d always invite some semi-known “rock” singer on to show that a) Perry or Donny or Marie or whoever was “down” with the “kids” and that b) the singer in question could handle “legitimate” music?
This is the audio version of that. You expect Dorothy Hamill to skate through the middle of this thing at any second.
Reggae versions of “Up On the Housetop” and “A Holy Jolly Christmas” provide some moments of — well, they provide some moments. Nothing else here does.
Homeless for the Holidaze
An Ensemble of Lonesome Fellas
(Sound Vision North West)
This disc was put together by a bunch of players from Seattle-area bands for various Seattle-area charities, and it’s a compendium of different styles ranging from “Pipa de La Paz,” a paso doble version of The Shadows’ “Peace Pipe,” and a rocking version of James Brown’s “Santa’s Big Fat Sack” (originally “Fat Bag”). There’s a down and dirty, horn-laden version of “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch,” Ventures-esque versions of “Silver Bells” and “The Christmas Song,” but the whacked-out excellence hits a peak with “Jesus Super Freak,” a roots-rock gospel with reworked lyrics from Rick James’ “Super Freak.” You better believe it. Get it at HomelessfortheHolidaze.com.
Christmas
Edward Gerhard
(Virtue Records)
You can smell the wood smoke coming off this disc, as Gerhard takes his acoustic and slide guitars through spare, wintry chord-melody versions of predominantly religious material. Nothing too far off the beaten track; “Carol of the Bells” and a tricky take on “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God” are highlights. I guess you could call it background music in that it’s not hit-you-in-the-face music that you can’t have a conversation over; heck, some of this stuff was used as background music in Ken Burns’ documentary on Mark Twain. But it’s virtuosic without lickety-split fireworks; it’s meditative without being boring; it’s fulfilling without being pompous.
Check Gerhard out yourself: He’s at the Inn on Castle Hill, on Ocean Drive, in Newport, Thursday night. A dinner-concert package is $195 per couple; go to www.castlehillinn.com to book and to listen to samples.
Peter White Christmas
Peter White with Rick Braun and Mindi Abair
(ARTizen Music Group)
Slickly produced, squeaky-clean smooth jazz takes on Christmas classics (Joni Mitchell’s “River” is an inspired choice) and a couple of originals, “taken out” in an almost-jazz style, but not so far out as to be mind-blowing or to serve as anything more than high-class background music.
Abair’s a fine saxophonist, and her vocal rendition of “River” is nice, though her (and the band’s) attempt to smolder on “I Can’t Wait for Christmas” is about as sultry as your mom. Quoting the motifs of other songs in your solos gets real old real fast, and unfortunately Braun never met a quote he didn’t like, cramming three into the first song. Rhode Islander Jeffrey Osborne makes a vocal cameo during “Silent Night,” but blink and you’ll miss it — it’s mostly instrumental.
Let It Snow Baby … Let It Reindeer
Relient K
(Capitol Records)
The Christian pop-punk group mixes attitude-laden rips through the chestnuts (“The 12 Days of Christmas” includes an original bridge about how few of these gifts you’d actually want) with earnest, piano-driven ballads such as “I Celebrate the Day” (“Here is where you’re finding me/ In the exact same place as New Year’s Eve/ And from a lack of my persistency/ We’re less than half as close as I want to be. … The first time that you opened your eyes/ Did you know that you would be my savior?”). “I Hate Christmas Parties” is a holiday-heartbreak anthem, the high-octane “Santa Claus is Thumbing to Town” documents the fat man’s worst year ever, and “Boxing Day” is about keeping the spirit alive (“But just for one day we all came together/We showed the whole world that we know how to love”).
A lot of these songs are taken from their Christmas album from last year, Deck the Halls, Bruise Your Hand, so if you’ve got that, caveat emptor. But if you like the idea of pop-punk and the hooks of pop-punk but had your fill of Billie Joe Armstrong imitations in 1998, these guys mix speedy drumming and slamming guitars with singing that doesn’t pretend it’s got too much ’tude to be in tune.
And while some of their religious material is a little over-emotive, it’s not overproduced, and the number of originals shows that a refreshing amount of actual thought went into this. And hey — Christian rock that actually rocks? Cool!
Christmas in Tuscany
The Eden Symphony Orchestra
Comfort and Joy
Stewart Dudley
Enchanted Christmas
The Clearwater Ensemble
The Tuscany disc, with instrumentation including mandolin and accordion and an Italian repertoire, is the most organic and interesting of this trio of records from Rhode Island’s North Star, as the Dudley is piano-noodly heavy, Clearwater is synth-string-laden and the Eden sounds like the incidental music from a made-for-TV Christmas Carol.
They all qualify under “mood music,” meant more to be lived with than listened to. Sort of the musical equivalent of the scented candles prominently advertised on the sleeves. Monster Ballads Xmas
Various Artists
(Razor and Tie Records)
This is a collection of Christmas songs old and new from the spandex-and-hairspray set, and you might be surprised at how stupid it isn’t. Skid Row’s “Jingle Bells” is Chuck Berry-esque, and L.A. Guns’ “Run Rudolph Run” is, perhaps obviously, even more so. “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” by Winger and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” by Jani Lane of Warrant are overwrought power ballads, but if you’re buying a record called Monster Ballads Xmas and you don’t want that, well, I got nothin’.
The lunk-headedness doesn’t really take hold until Firehouse’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”: “Rockin’ around the Christmas tree, have a happy holiday/ Bang your head right with the beat in the heavy metal way!”And Nelson’s attempt at “Jingle Bell Rock” is embarrassing, though Faster Pussycat’s “Silent Night” is bizarre enough to be, well, perhaps not scary but interesting. I mean, it could have been as fake-scary as, oh I don’t know, the song that comes after it, a minor-key “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” by Dokken. And Stryper sells a double-kick-drum version of “Winter Wonderland” earnestly enough that you buy it (and it’s live!).
Putting all these metal songs back-to-back poses a unique problem — far too many begin with plinky piano passages that the groups must have thought were a real hoot to interrupt and tear through with their awesome metalness, but after a while you’re like all “Get on with the song already!”
The KT Tunstall Holiday Collection
KT Tunstall
(EMI)
A daring outing from the young singer-songwriter, tackling some pretty untouchable stuff such as “2000 Miles,” “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” and “Fairytale of New York.” The first two only suffer in comparison with the originals by The Pretenders (and because Tunstall copies it so precisely) and Darlene Love, and the latter – well, only Shane MacGowan is Shane MacGowan. Still, knowing that someone in her chart position could have put out something as bland as, say, Kimberley Locke’s holiday record and sold gobs, hats off for the ambition.
The disc is rounded out with a playfully seductive “Mele Kalikimaka,” a weirded-out “Sleigh Ride” that includes bizarre vibish percussion and a rather straightforward but echoey, haunting “Lonely This Christmas.”
I wasn’t much of a Tunstall fan before this, but this is an eye-opener — a real rarity among Christmas records.
Rejoice Tonight
The St. Luke’s Church Contemporary Choir
This self-released disc by the choir and band of the Barrington church takes religious holiday material such as “Angels We Have Heard on High” and “What Child Is This?” and blends them with acoustic rock arrangements by the indefatigable David Lauria. Instrumental guitar versions of “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear” and “Silent Night” are sweet and memorable, and the choir and band blend beautifully.
Cecile Clement Grobe
Christmasland
(Big Noise)
The Massachusetts classical pianist has come out with a winning collection of Christmas favorites with a few similarly memorable originals, all done in a plain, straight solo setting. “Joy to the World” is lush and wintry-bright; “Angels We Have Heard On High” is ornate, speedy and precise; “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” is full of speedy flourishes, and the originals, especially “Christmas Eve” and “Evergreen,” are right in the pocket, accessible without being predictable, with enough off-kilter harmonies not to have to hide behind the Christmas-music excuse. A winner.
Yo Yo Yo Kids
(Razor and Tie)
“Safe,” “parent-friendly” hip-hop versions of Christmas classics. The beats aren’t awful, but all the rhyming is wrapped with gauze and done like — well, like they’re talking to a little kid. What age group is this supposed to be for? As soon as they’re able to speak real words, they’ll feel like this is talking down to them.
The Coolest Kidz Bop Christmas Ever!
The Kidz Bop Kids
(Razor and Tie)
You know, I get what the Kidz Bop series is about. I don’t like it, but I get it: It puts gobs of hits on one disc so you don’t need to buy 15 CDs, and they get a bunch of kids to sing it so they can a) not have to pass the rights fees on to you and b) change any lyrics that parents might find iffy.
Neither of those strengths are on display on this disc. First, there are plenty of collections of this stuff (heck, just look at this compendium – and this is just this year’s crop!) floating around, and second, as with the Rockabye Baby! disc, it’s Christmas music – it doesn’t need to be made safe. And there’s nothing about the eclectic but generic renditions here that set them apart. It’s not awful, but almost completely unnecessary.
Noel
Josh Groban
(Reprise Records)
Not many surprises here from the pop-classical singing sensation. It’s a collection of Christmas ballads in pop, religious and traditional styles, sung mostly in English with quick drops into Latin (“Panis Angelicus”) and French (“Petit Papa Noel”). There are guest appearances from Faith Hill, Brian McKnight and the London Symphony Orchestra; producer David Foster supplies the new “Thankful” and surprises include messages home from the troops in Iraq during “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” But Groban is still and always front and center.
His voice is as powerful as ever — heck, he’s still just hitting his prime, and it’s always encouraging when an alone-at-the-piano number (“It Came Upon a Midnight Clear”) is one of the highlights. But there isn’t a lot of new territory being broken.
I knew what this would sound like before I played it and so do you.
Sure, it’s Christmas music, so I guess that’s part of the deal.
But as we’ve seen, you can do a lot more with this stuff than you might think possible.
http://www.projo.com/music/content/artsun-xmasalbums_12-09-07_S38156A_v40.e1f772.html
