Old white guys have fun, too! (At everyone’s expense.) So let’s bite off a piece of easy listening mayo and chew, chew, chew.
Jimmie Rodgers lounges through “It’s Christmas Once Again.” That’s fair warning.
Talk-singing, Kenny Rogers sermonizes for the unenlightened in “Once Again It’s Christmas.” The harmonica doesn’t help your case, Ken.
Christmas is over, now. Did you take down the tree yet? Recycle the wrapping? Pick up the pieces of your shattered love life?
“After December Slips Away” was first recorded by its originators First Call. They lean into the God aspect more. Donny Osmond, for me, makes his cover about heartbreak. So we’ll sneak it in here.
Shouting out the pain Shanghai Liliy Dublin includes trees and babies in the abandonment of lost love. “The Day After Christmas” is best accompanied with fist pounding on any nearby handy furnishing.
Stina Nordenstam doesn’t borrow any Xmas imagery to feel left out in the snow (that’s not there), but her piercing “Soon After Christmas” dawdling pop is about the desperation of wanting to turn the calendar page but being frozen. C’mon! Binge Queen’s Gambit! You’ll make it!
The operatic power of D.C. Anderson doesn’t quite get in the way of the sorrow of “Soon After Christmas,” a recessional walk down regret lane.
Some musical attempts satisfy the distracted, as background mood settings i compare them to wallpaper. No heroic efforts here. Not even for winning over hearts and bodies.
Wade Arney Wade has a song dedicated to helping a friend through cancer treatments, but the pop slick country of “I Can’t Wait for Christmas” sells seduction short a bedsheet or two.
Sentimentalizing the loneliness of the long-distant posted armed forces, Danny Bryam lounges up “I’ll Wait ’til You’re Home to Have Christmas.” Fine sentiment, but with this cheap warbling it’s more a two-drink minimum than a two-hanky honker.
The O’Jays inject R+B into the love letter “I can Hardly Wait” but over-orchestrate and over-produce the love into conman commonality. Sounds like the Vegas version.
Just as weak tea is the easy listening “Waiting for Christmas” via John Legend. He’s classy all right, but trespassing on Bing territory isn’t his strong suit. Lilts of soul don’t save this formulaic fuzziness. Sorry.
Let’s try this again. Rather than dwell on the imminency of Christmas, we shall talk about our feelings concerning waiting for Christmas. Is it delightful? Is it excruciating? Is it just something we do while the end invariably approaches?
And instead of filing through bad, mediocre, and good songs each day, try we all the smelly, then all the okay, then all the bearable, etc.
Commence:
Music with Quinn dares to improvise a Christmas carol on-the-spot. When improv (accidentally) stumbles upon sense, we laugh with relief. “I Can’t Wait ’til Christmas” is not that pop success. The falsetto doesn’t help.
Swing band jazz promises cool. But The Chocolate Jazz Band knows too few licks and gets stuck in a rut of tempo through “You Tell Me Why I Wait for Christmas.”
Another who means well is Lambert Wilson. His electric piano rhythms, his thick accent, his monotone–they all make “I Can’t Wait for Christmas” fun for his immediate family only. This calypso easy listening polka mashup is the casserole left in the corner of the buffet.
Some pop music seems so manufactured it’s as if a corporation strung cliches Mad Libs style over a tuneless beat. Easy listening. Middle of the road. Flavorless, but for some attempting.
David Meece is slinging the sounds of “Almost Christmas Time” as loudly as his vocal coach will let him. My ears are empty, though, and ringing.
Kidsong tends to pander in such an unwholesome way i believe only real squares can dig it. “I’m Almost Ready for Christmas” from Kidzone has such apple-cheeked gusto i’m tempted to adore it ironically. But, no.
Rob Hegel and Nataly Lola put the Bacharach in country music (not a good smashup) with “It’s Almost Christmas.” Is this about anything but mood?
Well, we need something good, so let’s put on some comedy. Sunfacer Productions fools around but gets to a folky rock over synthesized laffer “It’ll be Christmas Soon.” That’s how you sell mediocrity! (With an angry message sugar-coated with wispy woo-oohs.) Yea.
How crazy do you have to be to be a mall Santa?
The Gebharts aren’t crazy about their “Shopping Mall Santa,” but their dry as a hangover garage-quiet-rock makes their protagonist gonzo as blueberry Wheaties.
Murder the Mood metalicize “Mall Santa” to transform into stand-in Big Red. It’s like a secret identity, but head-bangin’ is the power.
Welcome back, Red State Update! “Sit on Santa’s Lap” is a chimey white easy-listening rap that threatens and invites in varying amounts. It’s off the Rails Steak House!
Lights for Jesus, check. Lights for family, check. Anyone else need to see these around Christmas?
Antony Field kidsongs “Puttin’ Up the Christmas Lights” in order for Santa Claus to find the house. They’re good for that!
The Ohio City Singers swings the blues with “Waiting on a Red Light.” This story warns of who is coming Christmas Eve. So… i’m not sure if there are traffic signals involved, or the prostitute’s neighborhood, or it’s just a good time to go monochrome for the big guy.
The light Santa needs is generally the freak-nose-show from the head of his herd. But Kitty Wells attempted to outsing that Rudolphjuggernaut in “Dasher with the Light Upon His Tail.” This country swanger beleaguers imagery–don’t imagine this one at home, kids!
It’s leading, it’s guiding, it’s got a map unfolded and a ray pointing… Look! That star!!
Studio Musicians (!) set a military march beat for their caravan figuring what to do “With a Star That Bright.” It’s definitely guiding us, hup to.
Slim Whitman lends his charisma to “Star of the East.” It’s guiding us all, my children. Hope. Tranquility. Eternity. Go on, now. (Judy Garland‘s take on this is much less reassuring.) (Oakwood Waits make a stentorian antiquity out of this–yowza!)
Let’s anthropomorphize that Star of the Nativity a bit more.
Diamond Rio compares the beacon with a candle in the wind in “The Star Still Shines.” It beckons, wise men. If you lose your way, you get this hint o’ light. I mean today.
It shines, it dispels, it beckons, it guides all y’all. “Star of Wonder” from James Loynes is middle of the road easy listening for a grand recital showing. What a busy star.
So that star of Bethlehem… what’s it doing pre-xactly? Well, that depends on the carol. Sometimes it just shines.
“Shine Like a Star in the Morning” helps us identify (God knows I’m gonna…) with that blazing point of light. If not Nativity, at least folk power ballad. The Seeger Sisters antiquify it. John Reischmann and the Jaybirds prettify it. Elizabeth Mitchell simplifies it (digging that snare).
It only shines on Christmas Eve, ’cause it’s the “Christmas Eve Star.” So say The Boy From Space. If you believe. Odd alt.
More personalization from NoNameBand with “I am a Star.” The brassy offkey marching music makes me miss Ethel Merman. But the star just brightly shines. (And the song seems to cut off, is this just a teaser?!)