Falalalalalalalala - The Christmas roundup!

So last week’s impromptu review of the mediocre-but-free iTunes Christmas sampler got me to thinking.  This project is all about finding new favourite bands and new favourite songs.  Surely Christmas which is arguably my longest running musical rut should be no exception.  In fact, one of the best presents I was given over the past few years (through a very violent Yankee Swap – see here for rules: http://www.yankee-swap.net) was the Sufjan Stevens five-album Christmas box-set, which has become a new tradition in our household over the past few years, something my hubby and I can enjoy together as we build new Christmas traditions around our existing ones.  As a result this week I’ve gone off-piste a bit and have reviewed a few new Christmas albums and ignored the usual format, devil be damned.  Hope it inspires you to try out a few newbies yourself:

Christmas, Thanks for Nothing - Slow Club 

First up is Slow Club, a band I’ve never even heard of before but if their fan pages and press are anything to go by, these guys are making waves.  Formed from the ashes of Sheffield band The Lonely Hearts back in 2006, they’ve put out a couple of albums Yeah So (2009) and the EP Let’s Fall Back in Love (2008) both of which I’m suddenly very interested in.  If I said I was very up on the Sheffield music scene, I’d be lying.  This 6-song goodie is wonderful in the best of Christmas album ways.  A few credible reinventions of modern classics (notably notably “It’s Christmas, Baby Please Come Home”) but where they really shine are their originals, “Christmas, Thanks for Nothing” and “Christmas TV.” Although as grouchy and underwhelmed as you’d expect an indie Christmas album to be, they really do it with gusto and lovely musicality.  This is going in the Sufjan camp of albums we’ll be listening to from now on.  Also, as I said I’ll now be investigating their back catalogue.  ****1/2

A Damaged Christmas Gift to You – Various Artists

I’ll just start this off by saying that this is not an album for the traditionalist and my resistance to it was very very high as a result.  However, for pure entertainment value, it’s excellent; I defy anyone to hear Helen Love’s “Merry Christmas, (I Don’t Wanna Fight),” complete with samples from “Super Trooper” and “Teenage Kicks” and not smile.  Ditto for “Silver Bells” by Cuckooland.  “Stop the Calvary” by Severe absolutely rocks.  Songs I could live without?  “Santa Claus” by Thee Headcoatees.  I get that people hate sentimentality, but writing an explicit song about BJs and naming it after Father Christmas is a little tough to swallow.  See what I did there?  So this album is really good for a raucous Christmas dinner with a bunch of middle-aged bourgeois who like feeling that they’re still young and cool (ie me and my friends) and hence I’ll enjoy putting this on in the background on the 23^rd when we host said dinner, but it is unlikely to make the cut for the primetime events on the 24^th and 25^th.  I’m too in love with the White Christmas I grew up on to be ironic on Christmas day.  That’s just exhausting.  ***1/2

Midwinter Graces – Tori Amos

Tori Amos is basically a madrigal singer year-round so I’m truly surprised that it took her this long to record a Christmas album.  But nevertheless, she’s finally done it.  And it would hold its own next to any of Josh Groban’s efforts for the fifty-something set.  At least so says I.  But Tori Amos has been listing that way for a long time.  She’s not far off Cindy Lauper in terms of her proclivity for big-band backup.  But here’s the thing: yes, it’s sappy, but it’s also very pretty and this album is something I would like to have on during the cooking of Christmas dinner.  It’s nowhere near Sufjan, but it’s still credible as a Christmas album.  And if Cindy, er, Tori were still angry and singing about abortion, she couldn’t record a Christmas album like this.  You need to love life to do this.  So while I won’t be rushing to her next gig as I think she’s lost the edge that once made her so great to listen to (as least when I was a teenage girl), I’d say this is one album I will be listening to again next Christmas.  I might even give it to my mom.  ***1/2

Wintermusik – Nils Frahm

This short album is so beautiful I can’t even tell you.  According to his MySpace page, “he was taught to play piano by Nahum Brodski – a student of the last scholar of Tschaikowski.”  Pretty awesome beginnings for a classical musician.  Anyway, I’m no classical buff, but I really love the ethereal quality of this music and find listening to it to be far more like “swimming in a lake at night” than Jesca Hoop could ever hope to be.  There’s a cold quality to this recording; not as in lifeless or harsh, but as in seeing your breath before you, fingers going numb.  Apparently it was originally intended as a Christmas gift for his friends and family and the love in it is obvious.  I’m so pleased he decided to share it. ****1/2

This is it for the next three weeks – even husswives need vacations every now and again.  So off to New York we go to soak up the family and festivities.  But not before I wish everyone a happy and healthy holiday.  See you in the new year!!

LA LA Land - Jesca Hoop; The Heavy; iTunes Christmas Sampler

Apologies for the delay in this week's post - I was a busy bee getting ready for the holidays and playing with friends.  Now I'm off to make Little Dude a penguin for his Christmas pageant.

Hunting my Dress – Jesca Hoop

I was born in New York.  Not the cool part, mind, the uncool suburbs of Long Island.  Sure we had/have a strongish hardcore scene but it was/is hardly cutting edge.  Still as an official New Yorker born and raised, I feel a personal duty to bash LA.  It’s like it’s ingrained in our DNA – east coast=cool; west coast=yoga-swami-airy-fairy-crunchy-granola-shakra-BS.  At least that’s how I’ve always seen it.  My view is not always a popular view, but I would be lying if I pretended that I don’t bring this prejudice to any music from the West Coast.  And the bands I like from out there, say Deathcab for instance, I like because of their take on the airy-fairyness and their willingness to lay all of that side bare. Bands like the Killers, though I love their music, make me laugh.; I just can’t take LA seriously as a rock haven as my view of it is far too softcore.  And before you start ranting about the Doors, don’t even get me started on them.

Enter Jesca Hoop.  First off who spells their name like that?  Who?  And then there’s the backstory.  Mormon girl, leaves her tight-knit community to nanny for… wait for it…  Tom Waitts’ kids (of course) and BOOM.  Superstardom. And immediately I’m like, come on lady.  Who are you kidding?  Then there’s the sound itself – someone listened to a lot of Ani DiFranco and Sarah McLaughlin when she was growing up.  And yes, that someone was Jesca Hoop if her sound is anything to go by.

Tom Waitts says that listening to her music is like swimming in a lake at night (I’m paraphrasing) and I guess that’s sort of evocative.  And if you’re Tom Waitts, that’s an ok thing to say and he might be able to get away with that or maybe Michael Stipe, but otherwise, it’s just silly.  Playing to type?  Methinks so.

Are the songs ok?  Annoyingly, yes.  They are pretty and ethereal and there are moments where you think “Ok – I really want to hate this, but it’s kind of good.”  Case in point “My Boo.”  Who calls a song “My Boo” unless they’re Beyonce or Alicia Keys?  Come. On.  But it works.  Curses.  I guess if she swapped places with Regina Spektor and was all New Yorky, it would be easier to accept the music because it would be sort of ironic.

As it stands, it just bothers me.

Objectively, the music is lovely.  If you like Ani DiFranco, Regina Spektor and Sarah McLaughlin, you’ll like this.  And I do sort of like it.  But it annoys me more than anything else so I’ll be loathe to listen to it.  ***

iTunes Free download of the week – “No Time” by the Heavy

With flavours of old school rock and roll circa 1968 with Hendrix style guitars and growly Joe Cocker-ish vocals, it’s worth a listen.  ***

iTunes Holiday Sampler – FREE THIS WEEK!

In my family, Christmas was the absolute best time of year.  My mom made it so special for all of us with greenery everywhere, advent calendars, meeting up with our cousins to shop, going to see Santa at Macy’s.  It all started on Thanksgiving with the Macy’s parade and then dinner with our huge wonderful family followed by our annual viewing of White Christmas.  And then the season had officially begun.

The best bit of Christmas for me has always been the music.  We stick mostly to the 40’s and 50’s hits: Bing, Sinatra, Perry Cuomo, Dean Martin, Rosemary Clooney all singing the wartime favourites to newer and newer generations.  As we got older, it was A Very Special Christmas (1&2), BandAid and Mariah Carey singing “All I Want for Christmas.” The music was the common link across all my family and friends and you just knew that everyone was listening to the same stuff as they got ready to celebrate.

This week the geniuses at iTunes have been kind enough to provide a full Christmas album for free.  Its success is variable.  I could do without Rascal Flatts and with the Aretha version of “Angels We Have Heard on High” I expected to be inspired, but wasn’t, an unfortunate theme amongst Christmas albums.  However Weezer doing “We Wish you a Merry Christmas” is good fun, especially when they start to sing about figgy pudding and the original song by Glasvegas is really lovely.  And hell, what’s my montre?  It’s free and free stuff is good!  Merry Christmas!  **1/2