The Great Christmas Record Odyssey, Ep. LXXII

 'Tis the Season for yule-tide jammitude, masses.  Throw on your Christmas pants and let's get down to business here, shall we. . . 

Album Title:  A Christmas Festival of Songs and Carols, Vol. 2

Album Artist:  Various Artists

Orphans gaze at mankind's most boring collection of toys . .

Well, we're still chipping away at that Bethesda stack I purchased a couple weeks ago.  Like I said before, for 59 cents apiece you can definitely score a crap-load without even realizing it.  I cleaned those guys out and probably dropped, like, $6.  Zero complaints here.

So, this compilation comes from the good folks over at JC Penney, which, I'm told, used to be some kind of department store back in the day.  All the rage.  Perhaps this album's hilarious cover art reflects this, with a bunch of probably-orphans gazing longingly at a storefront window display jam-packed with super-generic toys.  The kind that kids haven't wanted Santa to bring them since, like, 1964.

No wonder JC Penney ate shit and died.

A parade of button-eyed, creepy-ass children.  Kinda reminds me of that movie Coraline.

I mean, look at this crap-show.  A toy accordion?  What kinda of monster would see something like this and think, "Hot damn, that's just the ticket - that's gonna be swell for Junior to open up on Christmas Morning."  Perhaps, even worse, what kid would actually want something like this for Christmas?  Some poor bastard who has parents deeply involved in the polka craze of the 1950s and '60s?  And is grasping at straws for ways to win some kind of affection from them?  How depressing is that scenario?

Anyway, let's get back to the music on this release.  I suppose that's what we're all here for in the first place.  The track list on this compilation is run-of-the-mill, non-offensive, vanilla Christmas music from the sixties.  Every Holiday favorite your grandparents adored while smoking cigarettes in their shag-covered living rooms and waiting for the fruitcake to cool off.

All these '60s Christmas compilations follow a familiar playbook, and so I wasn't shocked in the slightest by what I found here:  a couple country songs, an instrumental medley, a couple 'powerhouse' vocal numbers, and a few numbers featuring choirs.  This variety is par-for-the-course for nearly every compilation I've ever reviewed in the '3' to '5' range in this Record Odyssey of mine, and, not surprisingly, this album finds itself in similar territory.

Chet Atkins' guitar work on 'Little Drummer Boy' is a decent track, and even though I've definitely heard better versions of this song, there's nothing really to complain about here.  Same goes for Arthur Fiedler's take on Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker - the Boston Pops do a commendable job.

From Our House to Yours.  Yet again. . .

Those couple songs aside, most of the rest of these songs are ridiculously boring, and a select few have that distinction of being pure garbage.  The use of a children's choir on the opening track of Side A is jarring; why producers back in the day felt it was totally cool to throw a children's choir onto a non-children's music compilation is beyond me.  Unless I'm listening to a children's album - which, honestly, I can't see myself going out of my way to do - I don't want to hear little kids singing.  Not at all.  Nobody wants to hear that nonsense.

Mario Lanza, who fancies himself some kind of vocal powerhouse, belts out with a fury on 'O Holy Night,' sounding more like a guy pretending to be an Italian virtuoso than the real deal.  I've heard drunks perform better.  And choosing a soft, religious carol as your showcase number isn't really a smart move, either - show that range on a banger (like, say, 'O Come All Ye Faithful'), not on something that's supposed to be reverent.  C'mon Mario, this is Christmas Music 101.

So yeah, this is typical, fade-into-the-background, boring Christmas music, that offers up few reasons to stay awake long enough to register it's still spinning on your turntable.  

VERDICT:  5/10 - Meh (This is what JC Penney would sound like if JC Penney was a Christmas album)

- SHELVED -

- Brian

The Curse Returneth: Christmas

Happy Holidays, Internet!

Christmas morning in the Hough House, as the girls tear into stockings.

Well, we pulled off another frickin' Christmas, despite the Hough Family Curse's best efforts to thwart us at every turn. 

Like we've done in previous years, the plan was (originally) to have our immediate family Christmas in the morning, then, sometime around lunch, head over to Mom's in order to celebrate the holiday with Mom, Grandpa Chinery, and Chris, Jeff and their respective families.

Buuuut that's not how things panned out.

10 hours of a roaring fireplace in HD, courtesy of Youtube.  'Cause the Season.

The Curse decided to ravage my brothers' kids with a variety of illnesses that prevented them from coming out to Mom's for Christmas.  Chris' sons, who recently started going to a local daycare center, came down with cases of Chicken Pox (which, I'm told, is a pretty rare thing with infants), and since Grandpa's at risk for contracting it (I guess he never had it growing up, and it's somewhat dangerous for the elderly to get it), they couldn't go over to Mom's.  In addition, Jeff's kids were all running fevers at various stages, and so no one wanted his branch of the family over.

So, in the end, Christmas just ended up being us and Grandpa over at Mom's, but in the evening we decided to head out over to Chris and Nicole's to pay them a Holiday visit (and bring over some much needed mimosa reinforcements.)

Get ready for some holly jolly curse-thwarting, people. . .

The girls shot out of their bedrooms at 6am.  Like last year, we set a rule that the girls couldn't leave their bedrooms until that time, and so far it's worked out really well.  I got up about ten minutes before they did, and was able to turn everything on and establish the appropriate 'atmosphere' before they set upon their stockings like Viking raiders.  Hatchimals (shown here) were both on the girls' request lists for Santa, so they found their way into their stockings.

Alayna helps Watson open his stocking (which, sadly, had no Hatchimals in it.)

This dog will go to town on a frickin' rawhide bone, folks.

'Santa' has gotten pretty good at my stockings over the years.

Kris definitely had the nicest-smelling stocking - she's big into smells.

I'm using an external flash with my new 24-105 lens, and I'm pretty happy with the results. Definitely a step up from the usual whited-out faces you get from a traditional in-camera flash.

. . . although you have to be more careful with lighting, as you can see here.  Abby's decently lit, because the flash zeroed in on the edge of the box, but Alayna's far too dark.  It's going to take some time getting used to.  Oh, and these two gifts here were from 'Santa' - things they asked him for when we saw him earlier in the month.

I've said it before, but this chick isn't all that big on toys - she's 9 going on 16.

Abby, on the other hand, takes more after her old man.  Bring on the big toys, motherf***ers. . .

Harry Potter headband set (came with four, one for each House.)  She wears headbands like crazy, unlike her sister, who despises them.

Another year, another science kit.  Anything experiment-based is a win in Alayna's book.

Kris got a hand-decorated mason jar from the girls this year.  They had this craft fair thing at the girls' elementary school, and people came in and sold all kinds of shit so long that it was under $7 per item.  We gave each girl $5 per family member to pick out something for one another and their parents.  It was a headache, to be sure, but a lot easier than unleashing them in a store like Target or Meijer.

Star Wars underwear - a practical, if not hilarious, gift.

Alayna apparently got some granny panties, though, so we'll have to return them to the store.  That, or save them for when she's in high school - they'd probably fit her then.

Oh dear GOd, how I despise these frickin' Shopkins. . .

Kris got me a couple more volumes from Barnes and Noble's Collector's Edition collection for the Study library.  I have about ten so far, they're awesome - heavy duty leather-bound construction, with gilded gold pages and satin bookmarks.  This is a collection of seven of Jules Verne's most famous works (I'm a sucker for classic literature, it's my favorite genre.) 

And this one was Victor Hugo's Les Miserables - although I'm quite familiar with the play, I've always wanted to read the book.

Alayna got some Ivory bar soap in her stocking (she'd been asking for it so she could do an experiment she saw online.)  While Kris and I were distracted in the living room, she quietly put the bar of soap into the microwave and. . . . this happened.  Who the hell knew soap did this in the microwave?

You can imagine how much fun this was to clean up.  Although, I will say, it did smell nice.

Plunder.

Kris gets to work in her office.

Abby, not-so-patiently awaiting the time when she can open up another present

A wine-glass-shaped travel thermos.  For the wine-drinkin' mom on the go.

Abby made this for me in art class.

It's some kind of bird.  That's purple.

Aaaaand we got this, too.  It's to both of us.  It'll probably end up on Kris' side of the dresser.

Our girls are both huge Harry Potter fans, so this game - which they've never played before - will probably go over real well.

Candy for breakfast.  F*** it, it's Christmas.

Coloring books.  Can't go wrong with coloring books.

After seeing the girls' fleece robes they got for Christmas Eve, Dad sent me this picture from 1959 of him and my Aunt Lucy. . . . who just so happened to be wearing strikingly similar pajamas.

So we recreated the picture to the best of our ability.

Christmas cookies.  It should go without saying that I've put on weight this month.

Both kids got slime this year, as that's some new thing kids these days are obsessed with, I guess. Everybody wants to make gross-ass slime that they can then destroy furniture and carpet with.  It's a blast. 

I wrapped a 'mystery' gift under the tree this year, and Kris volunteered to open it up.  It's an old Westinghouse iron that I found up in our attic, way in the back.  It's brand new in the box, and, based on the fabric cord and old-fashioned box, was probably a top-of-the-line product in the early 1960s.

(I don't think Kris appreciated it.)

A festively sunny Christmas morning.

Bacon haze in the kitchen - you can bet your ass Alayna's a happy kid (bacon's her favorite food.)

Again.  This is why we're all putting on weight this season.

After a late-morning nap, we headed over to Mom's house for Christmas (and lunch.)

The girls picked out an ornament for her at Bronner's.  We had also taken her out to Genji (an up-scale hibachi sushi restaurant in town) one night a few weeks ago, as she keeps telling us not to buy her any presents.

They found a s'more snowman (s'moreman?), because 'Grandma likes camping.'  They had several different kinds, but this one has a cup of coffee ('cause Grandma likes her coffee.)  

Some LED lights for her bedroom (it came with a bunch of letters and numbers so you can personalize the message along the light string.)

One of the things she got us this year was a Halloween-themed runner, as she knows we're big into hosting Halloween costume parties.  She figured we could use it on the table, but it's so nice I think it'd be better suited atop the piano in the Study.

Some quill pens for the girls.  Alayna's is a genuine ink-bottle quill, and is a licensed Harry Potter item, while Abby's is a more age-appropriate ballpoint feather pen (but her feather is huge to compensate.)  Fortunately both girls were cool with what they got - I was nervous Abby would throw a bitch-fit upon discovering she didn't have a bottle of ink to dip into (and spill everywhere.)

Wouldn't be a true Christmas at Mom's without an appearance from Leon.

Around 4:30pm, Mom took Grandpa Chinery back to his house and we headed over to Chris and Nicole's to hang out with them and have a few mimosas.  The girls had never met the twins, so we all figured it was high-time that finally happened.

Tucker is incredibly starved for attention.  Whereas before he could usually be found hovering around Chris for dear life, he now throws himself at every possible person.  Can't say I blame him.

Louis couldn't take his eyes off the girls

If there's a baby on hand, you can bet your ass Kris will hold the hell out of it.

Chris' old cat, Sneeze, and Abby

Mom showed up about a half-hour after we did.  Here she's going through a box of pictures Chris and Nicole had taken of the twins.

Snack time.  You'll notice that these are all pictures of Louis:  Sam was in the room, too, but was covered with the Pox - I didn't want to take pictures of him looking like that (probably wouldn't have been appropriate.)

Time for a dance party. . .

Abby was really into hanging out with infants.  I think Alayna was more into the pets.  Totally not a surprise to anyone, honestly.

After a couple hours at the other Hough house, we came back to our own home, and - THANK GOD - there was none of Watson's usual post-Christmas diarrhea or vomit puddles awaiting us.  Truly, a Christmas Miracle.  We decided to end the Most Wonderful Time of the Year with a round of 'Nog and yet another Holiday movie.

Er, It's the Most Wonderful Time for a Beer.

- Brian