You're all about to think a lot less of me. . .
Album Title: The Care Bears Christmas
Album Artist: The Care Bears
We're really reaching into the far corners of Christmasdom here, America. Down deep into the black recesses of the Holiday Season, where sinister things lie dormant, awaiting their chance to rise up and unleash pure evil upon unsuspecting revelers.
I give you The Care Bears.
I saw this album at Radio Wasteland a year or two ago and just knew it was going to be a frickin' shit-show, but that would make it fun to review at the very least.
I was wrong.
You'd expect this to be the voices of the Care Bears from the TV series and movies, singing familiar Christmas songs - God knows that's what we've seen before in this Record Odyssey of mine, what with Disney's main cast of characters, with The Muppets, and even with Alvin and the Chipmunks. Those albums, while definitely children's albums at heart, are executed with precision (arrangements, sound levels, voices, etc.) Each of these childrens' albums (the Muppets might transcend the 'childrens' label, but they've always straddled the line between 'children' and 'adult') one can listen to without cringe-shuddering with disgust.This album brings forth the worst feelings one can experience while listening to a Holiday album.
For starters, it's like they couldn't secure the rights to any famous Christmas songs except 'We Wish You a Merry Christmas,' as if these hundreds-year-old Christmas songs aren't public domain. Did the producers of this album think there's a copyright on 'Jingle Bells'? What in the actual f***? Why wouldn't you throw some famous Christmas carols on an album like this, stuff little kids would instantly recognize and be able to sing along with?
That's just the tip of the iceberg, though - it gets waaaaay worse.
The voice-acting here may be some of the absolute shittiest vocals I've ever come across. Firstly, these are not the original voice actors from the 1980s series, nor the higher-budget movies (which, if you'll recall, I reviewed before on this blog, back when my kids were obsessed with both direct-to-video movies and watched them multiple times a day.) How do I know the voice actors are different? I researched it. I'm not necessarily proud of it, but I did it. They try and make the bears sound the same, and they sound somewhat similar, but are still noticeably different. Could they not even secure the original voice actors for this nonsense?No, they grabbed random-ass people to voice the Big Ten bears (the main characters from the show/movies), and this was the second big mistake the producers of this album made: these motherf***ckers can't sing at all. Not even in squeaky cartoon voices. For Christ's sake, even the dude that voiced Goofy was able to stay in character and 'sing' in Goofy's voice on the Disney Christmas album - here we have voices cracking, people clearly turning away from the microphone when they can't hit their notes. . . it's a disaster.
As unstoppable as this franchise was in the 1980s, it boggles the mind coming to grips with how little care (pun intended) was given while making this album. The arrangements and production of the songs is garbage, the sound levels are all over the place - it's like it was mixed by a high school A/V club - and performed on a simple Casio keyboard (drums and all.) The 'skits' that are featured in between and lead in to each song sound like they were recorded during an elementary school Christmas pageant. Obviously, little kids growing up in the 80s would've loved this album, but I guarantee you that this Christmas album right here, while played repeatedly by stupid children, caused dozens - if not hundreds - of divorces.
It's that bad.
If there is any proof at all that there is a God out there, it is that a.) the Care Bear Cousins do not make an appearance on this album, and b.) none of the songs chosen for this shit-show of a Christmas album reflect the religious aspect of the season. There are no 'Silent Night,' or 'Little Town of Bethlehem,' or 'Hark the Herald Angels Sing' to be found, and that is truly a God-send.
If I had to hear Grumpy Bear or Lionheart sing 'Away in a Manger,' I would 100% kill myself. No doubt about it.
VERDICT: 2/10 - Reality TV (This is one of the worst Christmas albums I have ever heard, and the ONLY reason it ranks as high as it does is because it could've been so much worse. One pity point is given because the producers had just enough lucidity to realize that the Care Bears shouldn't be singing about Baby Jesus.)
- SHELVED -
- Brian
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