C/D: Christmas music

This is the worst Christmas song I've heard in a long while. I heard it in a store and almost had to drop everything and get out of there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KSzYapIhhI

This, on the other hand, is great:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JpKiqublLQ

I wish “a Minor Threat Christmas” was a thing

skronk Christmas in an Albert Ayler style: https://marswilliams.bandcamp.com/album/mars-williams-presents-an-ayler-xmas-vol-2

yeah, was blasting out 16 minute xmas medley off that this morning - very good.

Probably not a popular opinion around here, but I picked up Diana Krall’s Christmas Songs in a charity shop, and maybe I’m just a sucker for a contralto voice but I’ve listened to it daily for the last couple weeks.

A Christmas Gift to You from Phil Spector
The New Possibility by John Fahey
A Charlie Brown Christmas
Merry Christmas Everybody - Slade
Christmas in Hollis - Run DMC

Bleak AF.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQgsiSth0Rk

Probably not a popular opinion around here, but I picked up Diana Krall’s /Christmas Songs/ in a charity shop, and maybe I’m just a sucker for a contralto voice but I’ve listened to it daily for the last couple weeks.

Seems like I've heard a couple different covers of William Bell's "Every Day Will Be Like A Holiday" on Holiday Muzaks so far this year, and I am so here for it getting added to the Great Xmas Songbook.

At a crafts & arts store: an album of acappella + beatboxing songs, featuring a rendition of Cohen's Hallelujah.

highly recommend Amanda Shires’ ‘For Christmas’ album

mostly original songs ~about~ Christmas that are really good & vibey - and produced without the usual christmassy instruments but still gives a christmas feel
warm sound, gorgeous piano in a big room
and a couple xmas standards

anyway i love it

also Aimee Mann’s ‘Another Drifter In The Snow’ had been a yearly favorite for many years now

Didn't know the Aimee Mann one so listened to it this morning and it is indeed very nice so thanks for that

I still prefer Sarah McLachlan's Wintersong though which has something of the same vibe

Alela Diane made a really nice one this year-https://open.spotify.com/album/0f65HaoVulkki85T2gTGeJ

My winter/Xmas playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1m444tcGkY42aZ2y8Fadmm

(Hood, mum, Stina Nordenstam etc)

My poll of 50 of my yearly favorites is still active for another few days:
Holiday Playlist Favorites!

In a moment of extreme geekiness, I made a playlist that (originally) contained every song mentioned in a Twitter thread in which BBC Radio 3's Elizabeth Alker had asked about people's favourite Xmas/seasonal music. I had the idea that I'd bung everything on Spotify and delete anything I didn't want to hear again ... but, as with many of these things, I ran out of enthusiasm. Here's what's left:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/16lHO2Lh2D6tbFPE1k5IFC

I intended to immerse myself in Christmas music this year, but have failed so far. The Christmas songs that I like have a tendency to clash against one another, like so many mismatched, tacky ornaments. How do I fit the Ramones next to Neil Diamond next to Alexander O'Neal? I've been struggling through trying to build a playlist for years. I can never seem to make it a listenable journey. How many versions of Have Yourself a Merry Little do I have to sit through before I find the right one? The right one is a Mountain Goats version that JD sang for the Onion AV Club 12 years ago that barely exists online anymore and is definitely not on Spotify - what kind of pale substitute is fucking Frank Sinatra, anyway?

Just call me Scrooge

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zELoHtKDp5I

One of my favorite modern Christmas songs is Why Can't It Be Christmastime All Year by Rosie Thomas.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYtR-a356Mg

there are some great jamaican christmas music mixes around, but I couldn’t find one that was kind of focused on a vintage ‘60s rocksteady sound. so i made this one. threw some ska and mento in for good measure ;)

https://www.mixcloud.com/abschied/christmas-in-jamaica/

Two new-to-me Christmas delicious chestnuts I’ve been gifted this year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYaB3q_h0ZE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orAVtA7mris

Also it has come to my attention that I love descant

What a spectacular compositional device. I wish they existed outside of carols and hymns, just a beautiful concept

mr veg got me the 1995 Luther Vandross christmas album <3

Lawrence is an unlikely source of Christmas songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAD0Q2h6lkU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbF5cDppz-4

Indeed

Prince's Another Lonely Christmas sounding like a sex jam instead of a carol is A+

fyi we are 75 minutes into jon solomon's 35th annual 25-hour christmas marathon on WPRB princeton: https://marathon.christmas

i worked in retail for much too long, so this is literally the only xmas music i now listen to

Holiday Rarities: Bing still chasing that White Christmas lightning, ditto Ella, Dinah, Louis Prima, Jo Stafford, June Christy, Julie London, Lambert Henricks & Ross (Jl and LHR my faves so far). Some of this is Seasonal, not strictly Xmas, which helps, as does lack of familiarity.
https://indianapublicmedia.org/afterglow/holiday-rarities.php

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gy6WyZQBtI

The WPRB marathon is the best! I submitted my Mortal Khristmas track last year and he played it <3

(this track)
https://soundcloud.com/found-river/lords-of-yuletide-reindeer-syndrome-mortal-khristmas

nice!

Strolled candy cane lane 2nite listening to Duke Pearson's classic xmas album on Blue Note, Merry Ole Soul.

Every year, the night before Christmas, at peak manic-children sugar rush, I terrorize the family with "Santa's Coming Over" by Low.

2 EPs/mini-albums that I formed attachments to over consecutive pandemic xmases that was way of propition to their real but slight merits - last year I was played them both constantly as chill out music in between the EPs/albums/mixes/whatever from bree runway, raye and shygirl (all nov 2020 and all still miraculous pieces of work, among the best UK pop of the millennium) so I definitely overrated them by association but they're still among the more bearable xmas music I've heard (towards the R&B side of "Traditional")now I have covid again so I'm bringing it all back

tinashe's comfort & joy EP - it's fine, often good, the arrangement I'm not sure the trap beat always works but I'll take it over sleigh bells and she sounds great as usual

kadhja bonet's california holiday EP - this is a very nice continuous vibe and in the right set and setting it would be a cool moodsetter. it gets a little wispy towards the end but it never sounds unpleasant even when she's covering my least favourite xmas hit (cutting the sleigh bells and making the synth calm down a little make a world of difference)

in conclusion these EPs are fine and even good a lot of the time but you don't need them

Last year's best new-to-me Christmas song discovery was "Maybe Next Christmas" by Ron Sexsmith, one of those artists I've long heard good things about but never really checked out, something I need to do if "Next Christmas" is indicative of his work, as that's a great song. This year I heard Tyler Shaw's cover of it on the radio, and see Tracey Thorn and a few others have covered it too. Are there any Christmas songs from the 21st century that are undisputed holiday standards yet? This may become amongst the first.

Guru Guru, "Dagobert Duck's 100th Birthday"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMWWbDIcfR0

(Dagobert Duck is the German name for Scrooge McDuck - though Scrooge is actually mentioned in the lyric)

I had never heard "December" before, it hasn't been covered much. I'm also not really familiar with Kay Starr and I'm now kinda fascinated with her voice, so win/win.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCOHYBPl12k