The Great Christmas Record Odyssey, Ep. CXXVIII

The Shadows of Mordor stretch out across the frozen landscape of mid Michigan, corrupting an otherwise tranquil snow-covered morning. . .

Album Title:  Christmas Album

Album Artist:  Jim Nabors

Happy Snow Day, America. 

With school called off this morning due to slick roads and a few of inches of early-season snow (for the 2020's, at least), I decided to scrutinize one of my dollar finds from the bargain bin at Radio Wasteland.

I know I've heard this Jim Nabors guy before on a compilation somewhere, and I vaguely remember thinking he was a comically bad singer, but I had no idea just how terrible this piece of shit was until I dropped the needle on this Holiday release. 

You ever see the 1977 Rankin & Bass cartoon version of The Hobbit (Tolkien's prequel to the Greatest Books of All Time)? Remember the orcs in that cartoon? And there were like songs that the orcs and goblins sang in the cartoon? Where they're hunting down Thorin Oakenshield and company, or marching off to besiege the city of Minas Tirith?

This guy sings like an orc.

In the same vein as the infamous Tennessee Ernie Ford, Jim Nabors is a hot frickin' mess of a baritone singer. Baritone singers should not sing like tenors, they just. . . shouldn't. You can most certainly write songs for deeper-voiced singers, but not all songs should be done for people this low on the audio spectrum. And that goes for like 90% of Christmas jams.

I don't care how many albums this guy sold back in the day, I don't care that he was a regular in Vegas and on shitty '60s variety shows. I don't. You know, a lot of Americans were exposed to lead and asbestos in the '40s - '60s, so there's a whole swath of the population who developed mental deficiencies severe enough to warrant purchasing this asshole's music. 

People also got swept in all of Hitler's crap back in the '30s and 40's, look where it got us.

Anyway, ol' Jim here decides to record a Holiday album. Why not, that's all the rage back in the day. He selects a handful of - surprise, surprise - religious Christmas carols, which I suppose we could consider a blessing because if I had to listen to this guy sing children's Christmas carols like 'Up on the Rooftop,' 'Santa Claus is Comin' to Town,' etc. I might just take my own life. 

From Jim's Home (the Tower of Barad'dur, most likely) to Yours. . .

The only song that sort of works with a voice this low is 'O Holy Night,' as the music works with a lower-register voice like Jimmy's here. Even 'O Come, All Ye Faithful' - which is usually a thunderous carol, about the closest thing to an 'anthem' you can get for a Holiday song - sounds ridiculous with this guy singing over it. 

He dials it up to '11' every time he gets behind the mic, and it's just straight-up jarring. There's no way people could listen to this in the comfort of their own shag-carpeted homes back in the day and enjoy this without being half-tanked. 'Jingle Bells,' a light-hearted Christmas song, must have been a forced march for the studio engineers to record - like most of the songs on this album, it's well-mixed and competently produced, but then Jim lays down the vocal track and torpedoes all their hard work. Case in point: one should never 'belt out' 'Silent Night.' That's Christmas Music 101. That's a somber song, there's no need to shout it from the rafters.

This whole album is like when someone spends hours and hours working on one of those competitive baking TV shows only to sneeze all over the damn thing while putting the finishing touches on the frosting.

VERDICT:  3/10 - Seriously? (I gave this train wreck a bonus point because the musicianship and production value is decent for the time, and had a better singer been hauled up from the pits of Mordor this would probably be a solid '5.')

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- Brian

The Great Christmas Record Odyssey, Ep. XXIX

Welcome back, fans.  For today's installment, we're headed south of the border for some Tijuana-fashioned yuletide jammage. . .

Album Title:  Christmas Album

Album Artist:  Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass

I picked up this gem during last February's great Record haul with Dad.  It was a buck, it's a Tijuana Christmas album, it's a no-brainer.

It should go without saying that anyone sitting down and putting this record on their turntable knows exactly what they're getting themselves into.  Herb's trumpet is prominent on most tracks, with his band's '60s laid-back swing backing him up on familiar Holiday standards.  It's unoffensive, familiar, and doesn't take any chances with the well-known material - which, for a pigeon-holed genre artist like this band, is probably a safe gamble.  Still, it leaves you wanting a little bit more in terms of arrangement.

When I picked this up, I was honestly expecting a more upbeat Tijuana-styled album from Herb and Co.  Not so much with this record.  This LP is straight-up, '60s, holiday cocktail music, with a Latin-infused twist.  Like several holiday albums I've reviewed previously, this is turtleneck sweater-wearing, cigarette-smoking, holiday-themed martini-sipping music one would place on their living room Hi-Fi while they entertain their neighborhood guests.  Only, in Tijuana.

(Why someone would wear a turtleneck sweater in Mexico is beyond me - it's hot as shit down there.)

"Hey amigos, anybody down for a nap?"

Anyway, the music, despite it's obvious Latin sound, is very '60s - just that slooooow, chill '60s swing.  It's much more chill than I would have expected.  I guess if you're a huge Herb Alpert fan - and you're probably not, as most Herb Alpert fans must be dead (that's all you can find in the record section at thrift stores anymore) - you can probably already guess what these slow jams of his sound like.  As if his band started falling asleep halfway through the recording process and Mr. Alpert just said 'screw it' and kept the tapes rolling.

I love me some Holiday, well-wishing, 'from our house to yours' messages on the back of Christmas albums. . .

All in all, it's an okay background LP, but not something I'd put on very often.  I rarely feel the need to wear a sweater and chill out with a martini in Mexico.

VERDICT:  6/10 - Decent  (As expected, and definitely not too bad. . . just a little too chill for my liking.)

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