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| It may be just a gimmick, but I do love myself some colored vinyl. . . |
I pre-ordered this double-LP when I first came across it on Amazon about a month ago, and it came in the mail earlier this week. This release includes two discs: the first is presented on
green, translucent vinyl, and is the '
Rockin'' disc (all the songs are rock and blues versions of Christmas standards and originals), while the second is on translucent,
red vinyl, and is the '
Groovin'' disc (these are all soul, classic R & B, funk, etc.)
Most of the songs on this album are badass - it's a fun compilation of Holiday jams, and I like how it's divided up by genre in case you feel like one type of sound instead of the other.
The Darkness' opening track is probably my favorite on this release, but there are a
lot of great offerings from The Kinks, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, B.B. King, Booker T & the MGs, Otis Redding, Leon Russell, and more:
There
are some weaker ones on here, though.
Tom Waits, who I'm usually a fan of, groans tiredly on "
Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet" with Gavin Bryars (whoever that hell that is.) It sounds like a sound engineer pressed 'record' on the mixer, then got up and left the studio to go get some Thai take-out or whatever, leaving two old men napping behind in the mic-room. Once and awhile these two old guys will talk or grumble in their sleep. Feeling the yule yet?
Didn't think so.
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| I wanna punch these two in the f***ing face. . . |
The third track on Side A of Disc 1, a song called '
Christmas Tree' by
The Lovers, is probably the shittiest song on this entire album. Unlike the rest of Disc 1, which is filled with rock and blues versions of Holiday favorites,
this one sounds like some French cha-cha nonsense you'd hear in an art gallery or a really lame Euro-trash party where everyone's wearing black turtlenecks and drinking white wine. I Wikipedia'd this band in order to uncover the origins of their shittiness, and discovered they're a premiere French band in the
Neo-Burlesque music scene. Yes, that's
exactly what it sounds like. And so it shouldn't be a surprise when the female singer whisper-coos the entire song, the chief lyric being the not-at-all-subtle
"Can you show me your Christmas Tee?" It's
beyond obvious by her highly suggestive, French voice that 'Christmas Tree' in this sense is a holly, jolly
dick.
She wants to see your dick. For Christmas.
The song is
really jarring, both lyrically
and musically (the style so out of place on a rock album), and consequently these Frogs torpedo this album by a solid two points all by themselves. Goddamn it, France. I'm highly considering taking a flathead screwdriver and just creating a giant scratch across this track of the record so no one has to ever hear it again.
"It's the biggest, most nicest Christmas Tree I've ever seen." Shut up, you French whore.
VERDICT: 8/10 - Awesome (A bad-ass collection of rock, blues, soul, and classic R & B, presented on two, limited, colored LPs. . . and pulled down two points by some slutty, French cha-cha'er who wants to see your dick.)
- REMAINS IN CIRCULATION -
The song is really jarring, both lyrically and musically (the style so out of place on a rock album), and consequently these Frogs torpedo this album by a solid two points all by themselves. Goddamn it, France. I'm highly considering taking a flathead screwdriver and just creating a giant scratch across this track of the record so no one has to ever hear it again.
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