Category: altrock

Drink N.B. Merry: nog2

‘Nog, like fruitcake, can be mere allusion to crappy Christmas property. Never had some? Who cares! It’s a quick reference to stupid adulthood–HA HA HA HA.

Sadly, some songs check the old eggnog box without any development. These can be fine Xmas tributes (ironic, sardonic, euphonic), but as salutes to sustenance–meh.

First Aid Kit chastises you nasty yulers with the garage rock manifesto “Do You Smell Eggnog?” Not so much about drink as about sin. Images of debauchery and sexual violence for the kiddies.

The Casual (featuring Ricky Armellino) tell an emo tale of Christmas miscommunication which hardly ever mentions “Eggnog.” It does BLUE ALERT defend LGBQT individuals angrily. And musically.

Julia Francis and Susan McIntyre perform a one-minute song in a one-minute song festival out of Seattle. “The Eggnog Song” is full of aphorism and attitude and touches on eggnog in a folk rock girl power aside.

Girl punk obscures just about everything in Electrocutes’ “Eggnog.” ‘Mnot sure if eggnog is sampled at all in this anger-chant. Pogo.

Caroline Schiff returns us to pretty prim poetry. Her “We’re Out of Eggnog” addresses bourgeois problems of this time of year, including i guess the ‘nog. Call me a sucker for mandolin tinkling, and a happy ending.

Many jazz noodlers have their own instrumental background music for the holidays entitled Eggnog for no particular reason, but Birmingham’s own, The Twang, have a nice number interrupted with the title (a la ‘Tequila’ or ‘Wipeout’) for a not ‘nog significant, but otherwise musically meritorious melody. Mm!

 

Me likee Richard Cummins singing coffeehouse morose about the holidays in “Egg Nog (The Norman Rockwell Mix).” It’s folk rock celebration with side eye.

Drink N.B. Merry: coffee

Surely a jacked up bloodstream keeps the carolers shopping ’til the night before… but it’s a shameful secret that gets little joy in the Christmas song playlist that WE NEED COFFEE this time of the year.

Jacksfilms of course comes to the millennial rescue with his minute of menu recitation “Christmas Starbucks Specials.” MMMMMM! But you may have to be age appropriate to laugh out loud.

A bona fide novelty Christmas song from Everyday Detour which harps on that old saw about Christmas Celebrated Too Early with the October offerings at the grind and brew: “Peppermint & a Whole Latte Christmas,” which at a minute and a half is a song as long as the title. Cuppa cheer!

 

 

Consume-mas Quantities: bless the bacon

Pigs is pigs, but bacon is a meal unto itself. And not six degrees off course, but whole platters of course!

[MARIAH CAREY PARODY ALERT] Farmer Derek admits all he wants for Christmas is bacon in his song “All I Want for Christmas is Bacon” which is not the worst thing i’ve ever heard despite the source material.

Mikey Mason also plays punny with carols in his “O Bacon Tree.” Not much bacon there.

Jevon ‘The Acoustic Hobo’ gets more personal with his “Makin’ Bacon for Christmas.” It’s a dad’s reverie about the perfect holiday. Here he strums!

Fitness Dan goes shirtless with his elctropop “Bacon Bourbon Brownies.” While this is technically a confectionary and should have been dealt with last month, this beefcake sells the meat with his elegant song stylings.

Jonah Knight crosses up my categories as well with “Bacon and Beer” (imbibables next month, fans). But what a fine tribute to overindulgence 12/25 (or anytime)!

Consume-mas Quantities: pizza on earth

While unrecognizably mutated beyond its Italian heritage, pizza is fine anytime. Even Christmas time.

Sadly, ‘Ding, Fries are Done’ is so far-ranging in comedy importance it has been pasted onto other foods as in “Marco’s Pizza Christmas Song.” Well, okay fine.

BLUE ALERT Pizzacat also attempts humor synthing a riff on Run DMC with “Pizza Xmas.” Was i wrong to spend a day on Christmas with Pizza?!

The Breakfast Kids fill our dietary requirements with a heartfelt rehearsal of “All I Want for Christmas (Pizza).” Yeah, they’re off key, but they’re on youtube. That’s cool with me. (Pizza is totally post script in this love song, but i got a blog to stuff the crust of.)

Oh, now I get it! “No One Wants a Pizza on Christmas Day!” Connor Ratliff and Mikey Erg slice off a piece of fine folk for the real meaning of Christmas pie. Sad, but greasy.

Consume-mas Quantities: breaking bread

We tend to fill up with simple starches earlier in the day. (One of my beefs is that breakfast is usually flour or egg-related, it’s so limiting! Find me a restaurant that plates up cold pizza for breakfast and i’m there!) We’re not talking stollen or yulekage, friends, this is the staff of life, ‘kay?

Bread, naturement, is a metaphor for the Christ-baby (he will rise again). Chris Brunelle intones Bernadette Farrell’s “Bread of Life” in an empty church, making it less holy and more rehearsally.

Annie Moses Band sings more mournfully yet professionally with “Bethlehem, House of Bread.” It’s an angelic epic, but not actually bready.

Can’t find any bread in “Christmas Biscuits” by Mark Geary with Glen Hansard (he of the ‘Once’ motion picture academy award song) either. Just a reminder of peace and love.

John Wright gets creepy with his impression of a five-year-old in “Bread for Christmas.”  His falsetto does the Birtha Da Blessed no favors here. I can’t tell if this is a cruel children’s sermon, or misguided ministry for the feeble. But i can’t stop listening.

The Oyl Miller Band of Portland OR have taken bread to a whole ‘nother symbolic level with “Happy Christmas Bread.” It seems to be some kind of odd family tradition here. The boys are in fine form and sing from the diaphragm, so God help them.

Sweet Christmas! cake 2

Some songs take the Christmas cake half-baked. Then there’s perfectly moist, a balance of tart and sweet, with right angles.

Cheat day: some songs sing cake and mean something (fruitcake) else. But if they only say cake then they may stand tall here in this category. So it goes with Arrogant Worms heralding the immutability of “The Same Christmas Cake.” Piece on Earth!

Christmas cake = home for Dulanka Nayanajith. Not sure where his home is, but “Christmas Cake” rocks it lounge style. This should be boring middle-of-the-road ‘music,’ but it satisfies my cake urges. Thumbs in!

Also from outside our borders Fresh Creek Dance Band transports us to the Bahamas with “Mama, Bake the Johnny Cake, Christmas Coming.” Feet be shaking while cake be baking. (If you’re xenophobic, here’s a nice school kids’ version to keep time to.)

Sweet as sugar, Rachel Debattista croons “The Christmas Baking Tray” detailing the process of making, baking, waking the cake in all of us for Christmas. Nice ice baby.

Heavy in my rotation is Rilo Kiley’s “Xmas Cake.” This ballet of new age misery sweeps around the room like the spatula of heartbreak, icing and neatening the confection of concern just for you.

Jesus Christ! and out

Let’s end the month of Messiah with some youngish cool music.

Big Star embroiders their light rock with a touch of garage singing “Jesus Christ” was born today. They seem happy about it, in a gen-x way.

Last word. Alt rock with Plankeye: “Jesu Bambino the Infant Child.” It spirals up to heaven with burnt offerings of splintered axes.

Jesus Christ! mother superior

A couple more mother issues before we pick up a new subscription:

Aime Mann tangentially touches on the feminine of God with her “Calling on Mary.” Seems to be more about the price of love in the time of mercantilism and happiness despite a heartless world to me… maybe i don’t get her.

You want to dance to proud Mary, plug in to Nina Hagen swirling up a sirocco of Middle Eastern music with “Mary Christmas.” What should sound sacrilegious, pounds terpsichorean. Get on your feet!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwShcD04cEs