Ep. LXVII: 'A Christmas Festival of Songs & Carols' - Various Artists

Here we go again. . .

Album Title:  A Christmas Festival of Songs & Carols

Album Artist:  Various Artists

A group so white this could be a GOP photo op.

I bought a stack of shitty Christmas vinyl from the Bethesda Thrift Store, across the street from my school, during a lull on one of my Parent/Teacher Conference Days at work last week.  I grabbed the absolute crappiest-looking albums I could find, 'cause - at 59 cents apiece - it was a no-brainer for reviewing purposes.  

This particular release - courtesy of the once culturally-relevant JC Penney - with it's assembled Aryan herd of children adorning the cover, promised to be hokey as all hell.  I couldn't resist.  Yet, when dropping the needle on the Side A, Track 1, we find a Christmas medley from none other than Arthur Fiedler that and the Boston Pops Orchestra.  It's not the greatest holiday medley I've ever heard, sure enough, but it's pretty good; perhaps this album was going to be another surprise find for the Holiday Season?

Then the second track started.  And I realized this album was exactly what I thought it was going to be.

A whole lot of nonsense.

Mario Lanza, who tries his damnedest to deliver on 'O Little Town of Bethlehem,' sounds like a drunken uncle at a family get-together, trying to impress people by singing along to the radio.  Maybe he can sorta carry a tune (maybe he front his own band back in high school) but, because he's six or seven silver bullets into the afternoon, he's letting loose with a gusto that is by no means warranted.  What should be a quiet, peaceful delivery - 'cause, let's face it, that's kinda the whole 'Bethlehem' vibe - instead sounds more like, "Bro, you wan'me t'tell yoush about this fuggin place called Beffenhem?"

Following up this diddy, we have a children's chorus deliver 'The Little Drummer Boy,' in typical fashion. Not horrible, but considering the previous tracks that have appeared on this release, it's definitely out of place.  There's a time and place for children's choirs, folks, and it's on frickin children's albums.  These 60's music producers were out of their Goddamn minds putting this nonsense in a Holiday compilation album.

Gotta love the back-of-cover inspirational message. . .

The worst song on this record, by far, is delivered by Marian Anderson, who warbles with unbridled fury on 'We Wish You a Merry Christmas.'  I'm assuming this was a somewhat well-known artist back in the day ('cause, I mean, JC Penney doesn't throw just anybody on their Holiday compilations, right?) but this seriously sounds like a guy pretending to sing opera in his best 'womens' voice.  I haven't heard singing this bad since Kate Smith graced us with her presence five years ago.  It seriously sounds like someone pretending to sing, it doesn't sound real - it's that comically bad.  So bad, in fact, that I was more amused than disgusted.

The Robert Shaw Chorale's appearance on this album definitely pissed me off, because their rendition of 'The Little Drummer Boy' is mankind's greatest version, and the fact they brought in child labor for that track on the previous side is kind of infuriating.  'The Twelve Days of Christmas' - which nine times out of ten is a skip-able song on any Christmas playlist, regardless of the artist performing it - is performed by a choir of vocalists so bad that they sound like they've been rejected from a church talent show, and this is their last shot at greatness.

. . .I could honestly keep going, but I think you get the idea.

VERDICT:  3/10 - Seriously? (A valiant attempt from Arthur Fiedler can't help drag this boring - and sometimes comically-bad offering - out of the muck and mire.)

- SHELVED -

- Brian

Ep. LXVI: 'A Sparkling Christmas' - Various Artists

 Welcome back, folks.  Today's installment should be pretty painless. . .

Album Title:  A Sparkling Christmas

Album Artist:  Various Artists

So this one right here I initially came across on Amazon while browsing Holiday vinyl, but after adding it to one of my lists the price skyrocketed.  I hopped onto Discogs to see if the price was any better over there, and was fortunately able to pick up a 'champagne'-colored pressing for less than $20.  

Once again:  as gimmicky as it is, colored vinyl is pretty damn cool.

So, the track listing on this album may be one of the greatest I have ever seen on a Holiday compilation.  This is so jam-packed full of Christmas classics that you could make the argument that if you were only able to spin one album during the Holiday Season, it should be this one.  This is a Who's Who of yuletide classics, without any of what I like to call 'new classics' which usually appear on compilations like this (pieces of audio garbage like Maria Carey's 'All I Want for Christmas is You,' holiday offerings from Michael Buble and Josh Groban, everything those assholes in Pentatonix have ever recorded, etc. etc.)

I mean, just take a look at this f***ing track listing:

Yeah.  Seriously.

So, I think that the weakest track on this entire release is Johnny Cash's take on 'The Little Drummer Boy.'  As bad-ass as Johnny Cash is (he's easily in my Top Five all-time favorite artists), he sure did write some God-awful Christmas music.  But honestly, if the weakest song on your album is written by Johnny frickin' Cash, you know you have yourself a Holiday winner.   

VERDICT:  9/10 - Cowabunga! (A nearly perfect record, which loses a point from one or two less-than-stellar tracks that are still somewhat tolerable.  If I could rate this a 9.5, I would.)

- REMAINS IN CIRCULATION -

- Brian

Ep. LXV: 'Boogie Woogie Christmas' - The Brian Setzer Orchestra

Alright folks, time to mix yourself up a Christmas cocktail and settle on in for another round of Yuletide jam analysis. . .

Album Title:  Boogie Woogie Christmas

Album Artist:  The Brian Setzer Orchestra

So I bought this one off Amazon about a month ago, as I've had this in my digital library for years and a number of Setzer's songs have repeatedly appeared on my customized Holiday playlists.  I was pleasantly surprised to find, upon opening the album up, that the record was pressed on limited-edition, green and white splattered vinyl.  And sure, while it doesn't necessarily improve the sound quality, per se, it does look pretty awesome on the turntable.  Colored vinyl is definitely a gimmick, but it's a gimmick that works, folks.

Anyway, by far my favorite track on this album - the the number one reason I pulled the trigger on this purchase - is Setzer's 'The Nutcracker Suite.'  This may be my all-time favorite homage to Tchaikovsky, since it covers such a wide array of source material and delivery.  All the highlight's of the great Russian masterpiece are touched on here - 'Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies,' 'Russian Dance,' etc. - and the track sways back and forth between Setzer's trademark, rockabilly swing and more traditional classical music (granted, with muted guitars.)  He knows when to put the foot to the pedal for the louder and more up-tempo parts of this piece, but also knows when to pump the brakes (when the melodies are supposed to be quiet and/or slower.)  Setzer is smart enough to know that his ballsy horny section shouldn't be blaring full-tilt throughout the entirety of the suite - smart thinking that so many other acts would've botched, for sure.

All in all, this is a fun take on a Christmas classic, and as a result this song has been featured in countless movies, commercials, compilation releases, and, most importantly, Brian Hough playlists.

Highs and lows from Brian Setzer.

Now, as for the rest of the album, we're left with what could easily be expected from Setzer.  Nearly all of the songs on here feature either the full-horn section of the classic 'swing' sound, or else the walking bass and surf guitar that embodied the Stray Cats (Setzer's notable band.)  Some songs - 'Winter Wonderland,' 'Run Rudolph Run,' 'The Man with a Bag,' etc. - work well because they're well-known songs that have been done in the past with a certain 'rock' angle, so Setzer's sound translates well to them.  Others, however - most notably 'Baby It's Cold Outside' - are terrible songs to begin with, and Setzer doesn't really seem to know what to do with them.  

He's got an original on here, too, called 'Boogie Woogie Santa' which is pretty painful to listen to.  It suffers from my number one grip of Setzer, and that is it tries too hard to be cool.  

Seriously.  F*** these guys.

Do you remember how, during the summer of 1998, swing music was suddenly popular again?  There were all these stupid zoot suit bands popping up, and it was all over MTV, and I even saw a couple of those bands perform at Warped Tour down in Detroit when my friends and I went to see punk bands like Rancid, Bad Religion, and NOFX.  Then, the fall came, and all those bands disappeared and were never heard from again.

(Thank God.)

Well, those swing bands tried way too hard to be cool.  Their whole shtick was just a lame gimmick.  Their stupid outfits, their blatant attempt at resurrecting a music and dance style that was long-dead before Elvis and Chuck Berry stepped on to a stage, but most importantly their lyrics about their musical genre.  Folks, if you have to tell people how cool you are all the time, you're not very cool.  

And Setzer goes out of his way from time to time on this release to make sure everyone knows just how cool he is, and he doesn't really need to.  I wish he just stuck to arranging classic Christmas songs instead, like he did with Tchaikovsky, because if he had done that this album could've been great instead of good.

VERDICT:  7/10 - Pretty Rad (A solid assortment of Christmas classic given the usual Brian Setzer treatment, that delivers from time to time but also suffers from the former Stray Cat trying too hard to be cool.) 

- REMAINS IN CIRCULATION -

Ep. LXIV: 'Scrooged (Motion Picture Soundtrack)' - Various Artists

Who's ready for the biggest f***ing disappointment of the 2020 Holiday Season? 

(. . .to date, obviously - 2020 ain't over yet.)

Album Title:  Scrooged (Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Album Artist:  Various Artists

I'm soooo pissed at this one.

Scrooged is a 1988 modern take on Dickens' A Christmas Carol, starring a top-of-his-game Bill Murray in what could be considered the greatest role of his career (right up there with Ghostbusters and Groundhogs Day.)  This classic is so damn awesome that it's always been, like, my third favorite Holiday film (behind National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and A Muppet Family Christmas.)  Kris and I make it a point to watch it a couple times every year during the season, and it never disappoints.  The music in the film, too, is great - plenty of classics, oldies, etc. - that are quintessential Holiday standards.

So, while watching the movie last year, I decided to pick up my phone and see if the soundtrack was released on vinyl.  Sure enough, there was a recent pressing (a Record Store Day release from a few years ago, I believe), and, coincidentally, shortly after finding it online, I just so happened to stop into Radio Wasteland and found a copy of it for a mere $17.  To the victor go the spoils, am I right folks?

Nope.

There's only one song on this whole Goddamn album that is even remotely worth listening to, and that's the opening track on Side A - the Annie Lennox/Al Green jam that plays as Bill Murray breaks the Fourth Wall at the end of the movie and starts talking to the audience as the credits begin to roll.  You know, after he stops acting like a douchebag and starts loving Christmas.  And the little black kid finally learns how to talk again and Bill starts making out with Indiana Jones' girlfriend.  'Put a Little Love in Your Heart.'  Know what I'm talking about?

But even with that song, something sounds off.  It's not exactly the version from the film.

As the rest of the soundtrack unfurled like a shit-stained bed sheet, I realized in horror that this soundtrack can barely pass as a Christmas record.  There's, like, three Goddamn Christmas songs on here, and they're all horrendous.  'The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire),' which you'd think would be slam-dunked by Nat King Cole, is instead passed off to his daughter Natalie Cole. . . and the results are, well, ridiculously boring.  She can carry a tune, I suppose, but she's phoning this one in and sings like she doesn't need the money (I'm sure she's got plenty of her dad's left over.)

I almost breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that Miles Davis had a track on this - where he teams up with David Sanborn, Paul Shaffer, and some other dudes - but his jazzed up version of 'We Three Kings of Orient Are' is so mathematical and filled with unnecessary time changes and signature shifts that it doesn't even sound like a f***ing song, let alone a Christmas song.

Every other waste of pressed frickin' vinyl on this album is a waste.  This is all late-80's R & B bullshit, and every bit of it sounds like it belongs in a middle school dance from my 5th grade year.  I was so abashed by the sheer betrayal of this album that I had to go back through and actually look for the parts of the movie where these songs were featured.  A Kool Moe Dee track that is listed on this album was in the movie for all of, like, six seconds (when the barely-clad back-up dancers in Bill Murray's TV production were practicing their dance moves.)  Another song that was playing in a rundown house belonging to an African American family, but so quiet in the background you almost miss it.  Yet another one was playing somewhere while two characters walk down a sidewalk.  It may have been on screen for about four seconds, tops.

But all those classic, nostalgic Holiday songs?  The other classic oldies that I mentioned before?

Nope.  They're not on here.  Not a one.

I can't believe I spent $17 on this.  I'm never playing this record again, but I am holding on to it for the time being so that it can increase in value on Discogs before I take it back into Radio Wasteland to sell back for store credit.

Son of a bitch. . .

VERDICT:  2/10 - Reality TV (This has to be one of the worst Christmas movie soundtracks I've ever heard.  I'm so pissed that I actually spent money on this train wreck. . .)

- SHELVED -

- Brian

Ep. LXIII: 'Music of the Medieval Court and Countryside' - New York Pro Musica

Jesus Christ.  I have a weird one today, folks.

Album Title:  Music of the Medieval Court and Countryside (for the Christmas Season)

Album Artist:  New York Pro Musica

So I was in Radio Wasteland a couple days ago, selling back some vinyl and perusing their Holiday selection (half- looking for some awesome new additions to my Christmas vinyl collection, half- looking for records so God-awful that they'd be fun to review in this Odyssey of mine), and I stumbled across this Decca selection for $5.  For being so old (1952), it was in NM/NM condition, looking as if it had never been played (sounds like it, too), and it's one of those albums that includes a frickin' 20-page book - so commonly found in classical music or opera LPs - that give you a history of each and every track on the record.

I'm a big fan of that.

To summarize said included literature, this selection of musicians and singers present traditional folk and religious music from the 12th to 17th centuries, commonly played in the courts of the ruling classes and in cathedrals across Western Europe.  Check it out:

It's too bad more albums don't have big, 30-page mini-book inserts like this - I feel like that's a missed opportunity.  Like, not just liner notes, but full backstories of how albums came together.  Wouldn't that be awesome?

This album sounds exactly like I thought it would, honestly - the kind of music you'd expect to hear while waltzing into a Renaissance Faire.  Or, perhaps, while waiting for a Loading screen in a Sid Meier's Civilization game.  To call it 'Christmas'-y is definitely a stretch, but these guys are definitely representing themselves accurately when they refer to this offering as 'Medieval Court' music.  If you've ever seen a movie set in the Middle Ages, and there's been a scene where there's a feast of some kind, in like the Great Hall of a castle, then you've heard arrangements like the instrumentals found on this album.

People couldn't draw for shit in the Middle Ages.

Picture it, folks.  A portly king, nobly drunk, red-faced and laughing his ass off, sloshing around a golden goblet of wine at the end of a long table.  Probably sloshing it accidentally over his visibly-annoyed and pious-as-f*** queen (who obviously sports a resting bitch face.)  Bearded nobles flank them on either side, some look drunk and merry, others dark and probably up to no good.  Courtiers, hangers-on, and ladies-in-waiting move about the feast, jockeying for position among the tables, all the while servants bustle to and fro, spilling shit.  Hunting dogs wrestle for bones on the stone floor, roaring fires illuminate the banner-covered walls, while bored guards standing about the perimeter, leaning on spears. 

You see where I'm going with this.

I'd say that aforementioned scene adds up to half the music on this album sounds like what you'd expect to hear.  These festive, instrumental numbers from a bygone era are solid tracks, and I can't find fault in them.  Do they truly sound Christmas-y in nature?  Eh, I guess if 'Good King Wenceslas' was the hit song from an obscure One Hit Wonder, this music could be the rest of said One Hit Wonder's catalog.  It sorta sounds the same, but it's definitely not of the same calibre as their hit single.

(And just so we're clear, here:  'Good King Wenceslas' does not appear on this album.)

Some stylish folk threw down on this album. . .

Now, the other half of these tracks are vocal arrangements - sometimes with just the vocals alone, and sometimes with an instrument or two adding accents here or there.  Instead of at a feast, these are tracks more commonly found whilst strolling through a gothic cathedral.  Now, maybe these guys are singing about Christmas - it's totally possible - but since I don't speak frickin' Latin, we're never gonna know.  This doesn't bother me too much, though; I mean, if these vocalists were singing in anything but Latin (say, English, if you will), that'd be ridiculously jarring, don't you think?

I mean, if you're traveling back in time to the Middle Ages, and happen to find yourself listening to an assortment of monks singing solemnly about what we can all assume is religious stuff, and they were NOT singing in Latin. . . well, if I were you I'd get the hell out of their real fast.  Latin is kinda their jam - to sing anything else would probably get them burned at the stake for heresy or something.

There ya go.

Anyway, in summary, this is pretty interesting record, and it's a unique addition to my collection - totally glad I stumbled upon it this year.  That being said, it's not something I imagine I'll listen to as frequently as some of the other ones in my Holiday collection.  Alas, had they only upped the Yule a bit on this one. . .

. . . and also alas, I kinda wish I would've written this entire blog entry in Ye Olde English, now that I think about it.  Son of a bitch. . .

VERDICT:  6/10 - Decent (This would have definitely been a strong '7,' but this is, after all, a Holiday music series, and I have to rate it accordingly.  I'm shelving it for this year, but it very well may end up in circulation in coming years.) 

- SHELVED -

- Brian

Ep. LXII: 'The Bells of Christmas Chime Again' - Eddie Dunstedter

Here we go, folks.  Time to get back into some weirdness.  Some terrifying, soul-shattering weirdness.

Album Title:  The Bells of Christmas Chime Again

Album Artist:  Eddie Dunstedter

I'm not gonna lie here, folks:  I totally picked this up from Radio Wasteland (for a $1) knowing that it was going to be a complete train wreck.  I mean, c'mon - chimes and organ?  In the dollar bin?  You know what you're getting here.  

You can practically smell the moth balls. . .

The opening track on Side A of this album is supposed to be 'White Christmas,' which - you'd think - would be a pretty straight-forward affair.  You'd think, with 'chimes' and 'organs' involved, this was going to sound like an every other organ-heavy Christmas album we've covered in this here Record Odyssey of ours.  Heavy on the warbly church service vibe, visions of elderly parishioners quietly nodding off all about you.  Maybe some dead poinsettias strewn about the wood-paneled walls of the congregation, along with faded gold tinsel and dust-covered hymnals.

Well, if you can believe it, dear readers, that would have been waaaaay better than what we have here.

The Haunted Mansion, ca. 2019.

For the first twenty or so seconds of the opening track, I wasn't aware I was listening to 'White Christmas' at all.  Instead, it sounds like the opening foreboding of Disney's Haunted Mansion, the eerie organ beating on in a sluggish cadence like it's summoning forth the deceased.  There's a few descending chord progressions, too, that seem to go on for minutes, as if the tormented soul hammering away on this organ is resolute in pounding EVERY. LAST. KEY. on the way down to the lowest possible octave.  

Straight down into the bowels of Hell.

Look, I know I sometimes have a flair for the dramatic, but if you were to listen to this album yourself, you'd see where I'm getting such horrifying imagery.  I've seen the likes of Tennessee Ernie Ford a time or twelve in this series of mine, but at least with that piece of absolute shit you have someone singing.  Here, without any lyrics whatsoever to remind us of a human presence in this recording, we're left to our own macabre imaginations.  

And it ain't pretty, folks.

May he haunt your dreams. . .

Dungeon music from The Legend of Zelda kicks of 'Winter Wonderland,' which later becomes a full-tilt, seedy carnival jamboree.  'In the Clock Store' sounds f***ing insane.  Cuckoo clocks and autonomic bird sounds over an organ?  With an overall German glockenspiel hammering away in a relentless swirl of noise?  It sounds like the sorta shit you'd hear in the heads of occupants in a Bavarian insane asylum.  Oh, and 'Ring Christmas Bells'?  The shit sounds like it's being played by the Phantom of the Opera on a two-week bender.

I wish I were over-exaggerating.  I really do.

If you guys ever want to see what the face of pure evil looks like, America, I'll show you:

Don't look directly into his eyes.

VERDICT:  1/10 - Ohio (This is the scariest Christmas album I've heard in a long, long time.)

- SHELVED -

- Brian

Ep. LXI: 'Christmas with the Clancy Brothers'

Welcome back, Internet, to America's Greatest Yuletide Event:

The Great Christmas Record Odyssey.

Perhaps you thought Covid may have sidelined this favorite Holiday tradition of Yours Truly.  I'm sure my wife was hoping so, but not even the dreaded 'Rona and the full, unbridled fury of 2020 could stop this festive, holly jolly train from continuing to chug on down to Christmasville.

Now, being the first installment in this year's season of vinyl reviewin', I'll once again direct your attention to the cherished rating scale we use around these parts:

10 - . . . And Out Come the Wolves (a symbol of perfection, and arguably one of the greatest albums made in the last twenty five years)

9 - Cowabunga! (if it makes you want to shout like a Ninja Turtle, you know it's good.)

8 - Awesome

7 - Pretty Rad (generally, in order for an album of mine to stay in Holiday Season Rotation, it needs to be rated '7' and up.)

6 - Decent (once and awhile a '6' makes it into constant rotation, but only if it satisfies a previously-vacant Holiday music niche.)

5 - Meh  (Albums in the 6 - 4 range almost always get 'Shelved.'  I hold on to them - for the time being - but they lose turntable time for the duration of the Season.)

4 - Borophyll

3 - Seriously? (anything below this point is put into my annual 'Donate to Goodwill' pile)

2 - Reality TV (there's only one thing shittier than Reality TV in my opinion, and that is. . .)

1 - Ohio (the Ninth Circle of Hell)

I've got a ridiculous amount of vinyl to go through this year, and, if previous years are any indication, I probably won't get through half of it.

And now, let us do this. . . who's ready for a bizarre, inter-holiday jam session?

Album Title:  Christmas with the Clancy Brothers

Album Artist:  The Clancy Brothers

Guys, this is just like that movie The Nightmare Before Christmas.  Remember that one?  Where the Halloween guy goes to Christmas Land (or whatever the hell it's called), and brings back all that he learns about their to his Halloween people?  And Santa Claus is kidnapped and the Halloween folks try to create their own Christmas, with multiple gags and comedic mischief all over the damn place?  Remember that?

This is kinda like that, except instead of a skeleton waltzing in to Christmas World, we have four drunken Irish guys stumbling in, reeking of whiskey and beer and wearing white, woolen sweaters.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Clancy Brothers.

These guys are some of my favorites, and I listen to them year-round - it's great Irish music, but it works when you're in the mood for folk music as well.  Along with their cohorts the Chieftains and the much more mainstream Pogues, they're pretty much the greatest traditional Irish group you can find.  You can imagine my delight, therefore, when I discovered that these paddies released a f***ing Christmas album decades ago.  That nobody bothered telling me about.

I picked up this NM/NM record on Discogs

- I saw a used copy on Amazon, but as a rule of thumb one should never buy a used record on Amazon - and spent about, oh, $10 or so on it.  

So, while there's nothing necessarily wrong with this particular offering, per se, it's not likely something I'm going to listen to regularly.  There are only three recognizable Christmas carols on the entire album, so the majority are traditional Irish arrangements about the holidays, and as such most of this albums sounds like a St. Patrick's Day offering.  Tin flutes instead of sleigh bells, fiddles instead of chimes, etc.  The only thing technically making this collection a 'holiday album' is that the Clancy Bros. are singing about Christmas and Jesus instead of, say, getting wasted and rising up against British occupation.  

Also, on a side-note, because their sound - and traditional Irish music in general - was so influential on creating Hobbit music in The Lord of the Rings, when you listen to this album you can almost hear what Christmas in the Shire would have sounded like. 

Which I bet would just be f***ing awesome.

VERDICT:  6/10 - Decent (If you weren't paying attention to the lyrics, you wouldn't even know it was a Christmas album.  And, because of this and this alone - because nobody talks shit about the Clancy Brothers in this house - it loses a few points.  Maybe I'll dust it off for St. Patrick's Day, who knows.)

- SHELVED -