My Kind of Merry Christmas

"Christmas songs have to be joyous, even if for all the wrong reasons," John Waters told me in 2004. "They have to be amazing.” I've let that be my guiding logic when I collect Christmas songs for CDs, playlists on Spotify, or this, this year's downloadable Christmas mixtape. Enjoy, and Merry Christmas.

1. O Come All Ye Faithful - Julian Koster's Singin Saw

2. Hey Guys! It's Christmas Time - Sufjan Stevens
3. Happy Sound's Christmas - Happy Sound
4. This Christmas Day - Don Rich
5. I'm Your Christmas Friend - James Brown
6. Black Christmas - The Harlem Children's Chorus
7. It Came Upon a Midnight Clear - Lew Charles
8. Little Drummer Boy - Ellis Marsalis
9. Santa's North Pole Band - Line Material
10. Run Rudolph Run - Keith Richards
11. Welcome Christmas - from How the Grinch Stole Christmas
12. The Christmas Song - Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66
13. Deck the Halls - Mirror Image
14. Love for Christmas - the Ebbonaires
15. Funky Funky Christmas - New Kids on the Block
16. It's Christmas Every Day - Hank Thompson
17. Blue Christmas - Tommy Wills
18. Joy to the World - St. Amanita
19. I'll Be Home for Christmas - Wayne King and His Orchestra
20. You're All I Want for Christmas - Brook Benton
21. Good King Wenceslas - John Fahey
22. It Doesn't Often Snow on Christmas - Pet Shop Boys
23. Marshmallow World - Darlene Love
24. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer - Andre Kostelanetz
25. (It's a) Happy Holiday - The Shells
26. Be There for Christmas - Ledisi
27. Jingle Bells - Marcus Roberts
28. The Christmas Polka - Jim Reeves
29. Merry Christmas, Everybody - Stompin' Tom Connors
30. I'll Be Home for Christmas - Al Green
31. Santa Doesn't Cop Out on Dope - Sonic Youth

For those who like a more active Christmas celebration, Kat and I will once again lead the third annual Caroling Pub Crawl at 7 p.m., December 13 leaving from The Kingpin (1307 Lyons St.). We hope you'll join us, and as is the case every year, talent is optional.

No Escape

There's nothing quite like the right wing vitriol that accompanies Christian, white middle-aged males discovering that other voices count too. Any diminution of the remarkably wide sphere of influence they're used to is greeted as if it were part of a plot to dig a big hole and bury them all alive. Unfortunately, there's also no escape from that hostility, most of it directed toward President Obama. Today in my Google alert for Christmas music - an obsession - I found that the War Cry of the Wounded Conservative naturally extends to discussions of Christmas music.

Good Grief

Here's a review I found online that fascinates me a) because I love the title of the album, and b) because for all the description, I don't have any sense of the music at all. I'm not even sure it's a Christmas album.

A Charlie Brown Death Metal Christmas...
I am unsure how to rate this album. I really am. I know for sure that I absolutely love it. Is it progressive? Oh yes. Is it experimental? Oh yes. Is it original? ...

It is so many things. This is one of the most disjointed and unnerving albums full of so many flowing styles and mixes. Styles touched go anywhere form progressive rock and death metal, to indie rock and jazz. So many brilliant musical ideas are given to you, and with such conviction. Folk passages with clean vocals, death metal stomping in the midst of pretty sounds. The lyrics are something to ponder. This entire record strikes me as a virulent enigma, yet it captivates me with so vitriol.

The songs flow into each other in a way, and the entire album has an atmosphere (one that changes rather often.) The acoustic passages are beautiful, the heavy sections are well played and sound strong. One song in particular "Sleep is a Curse" is one of the prettiest pieces of music I have ever heard. How could they have come up with such a style? I do not know, and it makes this hard to rate.

The music is most certainly not easily accessible. It will alienate death metal and heavy fans, and it will alienate fans of soft acoustic/folk music. But, whatever they choose to do, they do so vibrantly, so skillfully, and with so many evocative melodies that entrance me completely.

There are interludes interspersed through the main songs, and are quite enticing. The entire album never stops being highly intriguing. So much material here to delve int0o and get lost in the lilting sounds. I will give this 5 stars. It is highly experimental and progressive, the songs go from powerfully brutal and dark, to emotionally moving and majestically pretty. By no means essential to everyone, but essential to me.

Start Saving Up

This almost makes me regret my affection for Christmas music:

YMC Records and Ali Lohan are kicking off the Christmas season with the release of her debut album, Lohan Holiday, which will be available in stores on November 21st. Following in the footsteps of older sister Lindsay, Lohan is taking the teen pop music scene by storm with a holiday-themed record that celebrates her love of the Christmas season. Lohan Holiday is an infectious and up-beat album that features the hit single "I Like Christmas" and classic songs such as “Deck The Halls,” “Jingle Bells” and
“Silent Night.” In addition to original tracks such as “Christmas Magic” and “Christmas Day,” Ali’s vocals were digitally added to the critically acclaimed singer Amy Grant’s song,
“Santa's Reindeer Ride," originally recorded by Grant as a teenager at the start of her career. The song captures the holiday spirit as reflected by two generations of up-and-coming pop sensations.

Lohan Holiday is not only the perfect stocking stuffer, but great for the family sing-a-longs during this year’s celebrations. For more information check out www.AliLohanMusic.com.

Track Listing:

1. “Christmas Day”
2. “I Like Christmas”
3. “Winter Wonderland”
4. “Christmas Magic”
5. “Jingle Bells”
6. “Groove of Christmas”
7. “Lohan Holiday”
8. “Deck The Halls”
9. “Silent Night”
10. “Santa’s Reindeer Ride” featuring Amy Grant
11. “We Wish You A Merry Christmas”
12. “I Like Christmas” (Remix)

Almost. There's a lot to love in all of that - songs called "Lohan Holiday" and the uberbanal "I Like Christmas", the requisite Lindsay reference, hype for a Christmas album a mere 7 or 8 shopping months' early, and Ali's voice added to an Amy Grant track. Y'know, it was creepy enough when Natalie Cole first did that with a Nat King Cole song, but at least that had some father/daughter drama to make it interesting. This is just Ali stapling her voice to a successful track by someone else, a naked attempt to be successful in some vague, purposeless, honorless, talent-neutral way.

Why People Don't Like Christmas Music

I'm pro-Christmas music, and when people tell me how much they don't like Christmas music, it often comes down to the context in which they hear it. Recently, a friend said she hated it because she heard it relentlessly on an easy listening station in the office next to hers. Of course, there's little on an easy listening station she'd like the other 11 months of the year, so it's unlikely it would play Christmas music she'd like either. And any omnipresent music - even stuff you like - eventually wears you out, and if it's an unwelcome visitor from the next office, it's triply problematic. So often, we hear Christmas music in emotionally challenging circumstances - shopping, family get-togethers - which makes it no surprise that the associations we make with Christmas music are often bad ones.

Recently, I received an email link to an eMusic Christmas downloadable mix, and it suggested another problem. The playlist is:

1. Deck the Halls: Twisted Sister
2 Why Can't It Be Christmastime All Year: Rosie Thomas
3 Angels We Have Heard On High: The Brian Setzer Orchestra
4 Holiday Mood: Apples In Stereo
5 Little Drummer Boy: Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra
6 Something to Hold On To (At Christmas): Ron Sexsmith
7 Jingle Bells: Lisa Loeb
8 The Twelve Days of Christmas: Kidz Bop Kids
9 Bach: Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring: Angele Dubeau & La Pieta
10 Darlin' (Christmas is Coming): Over The Rhine
11 Noel: Robin Gibb
12 Auld Lang Syne: The Smithereens

I started to download it and stopped because I can't imagine ever wanting to hear that mix. First, all versions of "The Twelve Days of Christmas" are testers, but who but the most ironic listener would enjoy hearing "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" and Kidz Bop Kids and Brian Setzer and Twisted Sister? It's the sort of mix that guarantees a degree of antipathy toward Christmas music. Something more coherent like Jared Boxx's "Soul Santa" mixtape podcast makes a far more convincing argument for Christmas music as a satisfying listening experience.

A Downloadable Soul Christmas

'Tis the season, and while I've been sorting through this year's Christmas CDs (particularly impressed by Ledisi's It's Christmas, and I'm always impressed by the intelligence of Harry Connick, Jr.'s arrangements, this year on What a Night).

Still, I keep returning to soul and doo wop Christmas music, and I'm listening regularly to Daptone Records' "Soul Santa" free podcast. Alison Fensterstock at Gambit Weekly turned me on to Sir Shambling's Soulful Christmas Web site, where I downloaded a bunch of songs including Marvin Gaye's brilliant "I Want to Come Home for Christmas." I'm not always sure HipChristmas.com is all that hip - or "hip" is defined as "anything that's not Andy Williams". Still, you can hear a lot of Christmas music there, and they post a bunch of downloadable mp3s, the highlight of this year's batch is the Phil Moore Trio's "Blink Before Christmas," a hipster version of "The Night Before Christmas".

Although the song's aren't downloadable, the dean of Christmas music sites is Christmas Music Everyday. As the title implies, the site has a new Christmas song every day with only the occasional relatively known track (today's, for example - Dean Martin's brilliantly lecherous "Baby, It's Cold Outside").