Happy Blogidays!: A Bakers Dozen of Winter Tunes

If you are like me, and I know I am, than you likely find yourself, not that you'd lost yourself mind you, but from a figure of speech point of view you likely find yourself preferring the cold and wet winter months to their sunny, over-heated summer opposites save for two notable factors.

1. There is no baseball.

2. Christmas Carols.

Don't get me wrong, I respect the existence and importance of celebrating the importance of the holidays through music, but typically by December 3rd or so I've heard enough hall-decking, tree-trimming, birth-celebrating tunes of joy and happiness to make make Santa sick of the Christmas season. I also recognize the cherished place these songs have in the hearts of many, many people in this world, and as such, I cannot simply choose to drown out music for 1/12th of the year any more than I can choose to ignore the existence of the holidays the songs represent. It is for this reason that I have devised a plan.

Namely, if you can't beat them, join them.

With this in mind I unveil thirteen holiday/winter tunes that will allow the carol'ed out among us to continue to share in the merriment of the winter holiday season without subjecting ourselves to countless renditions of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas ad-nauseum.

The only qualifications for the list are that all the tunes feature winter, or winter holiday themes throughout, and that they transcend prototypical shopping-mall-overhead-speaker-classics to achieve some deeper or at least more captivating message than say, Jingle Bells.

Before I commence with the listin', I would like to note that both Christmas Wrapping by The Waitresses and Paul McCartney's (Simply Having) A Wonderful Christmas Time have intentionally been excised from this volume. If the opportunity arose in which I could control the whole of the universe, one of the very first things I would do is place a moratorium on these two songs until now earlier than the year 2030. If possible, I'd like to find a way to access the Phantom Zone from Superman II so I could send these tracks hurtling through space until an atomic explosion on the sun creates another super-being to challenge my... Oh... I just jumped from Superman II to Superman IV...

Anyhoo, I totally don't ever want to hear either of those songs again. It's not that they weren't good the first time, or even the first fifty times, but once you hear a song about three thousand times you're going to get sick of it, and I think I'm at about the five thousand times mark on these two. I blame my Christmas season mall employment during the late 1990's...

No matter the reason, just know full well that I did not 'forget' either of those songs. I fear I could never forget them no matter how much time or alcohol I put between myself and my last listen...

So without further adieu, or further noted exception, here's The List:

13. Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer- Gene Autry

This is the only actual 'Christmas Classic' to make the list, and it has very little to do with the song itself. The tune was popularized by The Singing Cowboy, Gene Autry who purportedly used the money he made from the song to purchase The Los Angeles Angels. Countless years of grief and a few short moments of elation and entered into my life thanks to this song and the baseball team in purchased. Sometimes, I wish Mr. Autry had instead just chosen to purchase and disband the Boston Red Sox instead. It likely would have been more satisfying.

12. Wintersong- Sarah McLachlan

From the winter release of the same name, this is McLachlan's only original tune on the CD, the rest being standards or covers of other holiday themed tracks by contemporary artists. Two of them are further down on this list in their original forms. The reason I went with this selection is partially because it's a good song, and partially because if you're going to put out a holiday CD, at least put an original cut on it. That's what Sarah did, and she thereby earns a spot on the list.

11. 6:00- Dream Theater

This is not really a holiday song. It is certainly not a folk holiday classic, and it's not found on an album full of holiday tracks, but it's a short (for Dream Theater) rocking progressive track that's well worth a listen. It qualified for the list because the opening line is '6:00 on a Christmas morning'. That's good enough for me, especially when you throw in a John Petrucci guitar shredding solo...

10. Deck the Stills- Barenaked Ladies

I've oft assumed that if I was randomly blessed with some sort of musical talent, and I used that talent to start a band, that band would likely end up sounding a lot like Canada's Barenaked Ladies. I consider their take on the holiday classic Deck the Halls, in which all the words are replaced by the names of the members of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, as a perfect example. This is exactly the kind of silly irreverent holiday song I would make up while standing in line at the Best Buy, or stuck in traffic on the way home from work. Before you start thinking that this sounds pull-your-hair-out-annoying, it's only a forty second long track...

9. Happy X-Mas (War is Over)- John Lennon

I imagine a number of [people feel about this one the way I do about The Waitresses and Paul McCartney tunes noted above, and I agree, it does get a whole heck of a lot of airplay. Combine that with the presence of Yoko and there's every reason to never want to hear this tune again. It makes my list however based solo on the song's intro. The clean and crisp acoustic chord followed by Lennon's raw and un-amplified vocal "...So this is Christmas, and what have you done? Another year over, and a new one's just begun..." For that simple and poignant expression of what The Holiday's mean to me, this song will always remain on my listenable list. Even if I skip past it after the first 15 seconds...

8. Jacob Marley's Chain- Aimee Mann

Another one like the Dream Theater track above that is really not a holiday song. Aimee also put out a holiday album that is very good, but I couldn't decide on a specific tune to take from it and my mind kept coming back to this one. Besides, what better way to ring in the season of good cheer than the line "Now there is no story left to tell so I think I'd rather just go on to Hell where there's a snowball's chance that the personnel might help to carry Jacob Marley's chain." Aside from being a brilliant songwriter, an excellent singer, and a great guitar player, Aimee is also married to another brilliant musician Michael Penn. They have no children together, which may actually be a good thing, as those children would likely be SO much more talented then any other children on the planet that they'd be destined to go mad under the weight of their own geniuses... Kind of like Prince...

If I haven't convinced you yet, Aimee also played the German nihilist who sacrificed her toe in The Big Lebowski... THAT'S star-cred...

7. Do They Know It's Christmas?- Band Aid

Due in part from the incredible selflessness of Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, and in part because it was the British Isles, and therefore much cooler, version of We Are The World, Do They Know It's Christmas? is another track that no matter how often it's repeated from November 15th to January 1st it still resonates with me. Keep in mind, this group was formed before We Are The World became a world-wide phenomena, so convincing all these artists to take time from their recording and touring schedules to do something to shed light, and much needed money on the conditions in Africa was somewhere between painstaking and miraculous. Many people have forgotten the music of Geldof's Boomtown Rats and Ure's Ultravox in the ensuing decades, but their contributions to pop music are etched in stone for at least one month a year.

If you are not familiar with the video for this super group classic, do yourself a favor and play spot-the-80's-icon...

6. Winter- Tori Amos

I could not make a list of Holiday/Winter songs without including Ms. Amos' nod to the coldest of the seasons. Her definitively idiosyncratic song style, signature piano, and memorable lyrics lead to some level of familiarity for the listener, even if you happened to grow up in sunny southern California only ever having to put on gloves to play baseball. We've all lived through the anxiety of growing out of our family, and the holidays are a perfect time to reestablish those connections, even if it means accepting that no matter how much you've grown, or how much you accomplish, you were once a child, and once shaped by the hands of your parents, grandparents, and siblings.

5. The Hanukkah Song- Adam Sandler

Not only a great holiday tune, but rivals Red Hooded Sweatshirt and Dancin' and Pantsin' for the best Adam Sandler tune of all time... OK, Lunch Lady Land is pretty good too... Damn, that Sandler is one talented comedy-song writing dude... Props to him as well for reminding us all that the holiday season is about more than just Christmas. After all, there's so many Jews in the show biz, Tom Cruise isn't, but I hear his agent is...

Here's the video...

4. River- Joni Mitchell

Kind of like Tori's 'Winter', this is not exactly a 'feel good' holiday season tune. I wouldn't call it depressing either, but it's definitely more reflective than celebratory. I guess that's a common theme among a lot of these tunes. I tend to think of the holidays as a chance to not only look back on the year that has passed, but also to remember many of the years that have passed, and many of the years that are to come. I guess it's understandable that when you take the time to consider your life at this specific moment when compared to all those moments that came before, and will come since, that it could be comforting to have a river to sail away on...

3. Father Christmas- The Kinks

OK, this one tends to fall more on the side of 'riotous' than 'reflective'. The Kink's ode to Christmas commercialism, and a warning tune to all the spoiled boys and girls who scream and cry when they don't get just the right toy. I think what stands out for me about this tune is that it's not a sob-story, but rather a rallying cry for the have-nots. Father Christmas, give us some money... Save your toys for the little rich boys...

Here's a poor-quality video, but the audio's not bad, and that's all that matters...

2. Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight)- The Ramones

A refreshingly realistic take on the toll the holidays play on our closest relationships. Fights over money, fights over presents, fights over which house you're going to eat dinner at, fights over whether to turn on the heat or open the window when going to bed... The stresses of the holidays put us all on edge, and we all tend to blow up irrationally at least once per holiday season. The Ramones remind us that whatever you're mad about, it'll probably pass when all the presents are opened, the tree is taken down, and January returns life back to normal.

I needn't say more, the video does all the talking for me...

1. 2000 Miles- The Pretenders

Every single time I find myself listening to a Pretenders tune, I end up liking them more and more. Perhaps it's the mix of classic rock & roll combined with the ahead-of-their-time vocals of Chrissie Hynde that would have been just as at home on a New York club stage in the early 2000's as they were on the streets of London in 1978. As deep and rocking as so much of their catalog is, this track has that open and reflective quality that is common in so many of these wintertime favorites.

It also helps that it's another tune that's not immediately thought of as a 'holiday song'.

Enjoy the #1 Winter track by The Pretenders...

Have a wonderful end-of-the-year and I'll see you... well... digitally... in 2009!

6:00 On A Christmas Morning…

So is it just me, or has this week been interminably long? It seems like I’ve been here at work for the last 314 days straight. I’m sure it couldn’t have anything to do with the fact I’m going on vacation next week… Speaking of things that seemingly go on forever driving one to madness, I’m currently listening to some Dream Theater (Hence, the name of the post). Now I know what you’re thinking, ‘but OCK, I never pictured you as a prog-rock geek… Do you have long flowing hair and posters of unicorns on your bedroom walls?’ I’m sorry to disappoint, but the answer to both those questions is sadly no… Cruise Ship Director Julie has instituted a ‘no unicorn’ zone in the inner sanctum, and besides, you don’t have to obsess over which incarnation of Thor is closest to the original Nordic myth to enjoy progressive rock. (BTW, It's the one to the right, if you're still debating...) Prog-rock can be for everybody, at least everybody with a good amount of patience and a minimum of 12 minutes to devote to each song…

I feel it is my duty as an unknown Internet babbler and lover of all things Prog to convince ‘mainstream’ music listeners that you don’t have to play D&D in your mom’s basement to enjoy the likes of Yes, Dream Theater, Genesis, Spock’s Beard, King Crimson, Liquid Tension Experiment, etc. You too could make Prog-rock the music for ‘cool kids’ all you have to do is find the RIGHT prog-rock. I’m the first to tell you, if you pick up a random mid 70’s Yes album, say Tales From Topographic Oceans, the first thing you’ll notice is the Tolkienesque scripting on the album cover. I can totally understand that you may very well want to drop the album immediately and run for the nearest television showing a sporting event before your shirt spontaneously starts sprouting the words ‘Live At Budokan’ across the back… First and foremost, I highly suggest you don’t judge an album by it’s cover. Secondly, if you are not heavily into prog-rock already, I suggest you avoid TFTO the same way a beginning reader would want to avoid War and Peace. Accept the fact that you may NEVER want to listen to a 20 minute track entitled The Revealing Science of God - Dance of the Dawn. That’s OK, contrary to popular belief, one can enjoy SOME prog-rock, without enjoying ALL prog-rock… Instead, start with one of these 5 albums, you’ll be glad you did, and maybe, just maybe you’ll pick up a new musical obsession… Maybe you’ll grow out your hair, maybe you’ll decide to start your own witches coven, or perhaps build your own Viking ship… More likely, you’ll just add some additional great music to your large and varied collection.

1. Genesis- The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway
If you are like me, and I know I am, you probably enjoy both music, AND movies… I’d go so far as to say that if you DIDN’T enjoy both music, AND movies, you probably wouldn’t be reading this right now… I don’t mean to take liberties with your personal tastes, but I feel this is a limb I can safely go out on. If I have overstepped my bounds, I would apologize, but since you’re on the other end of a computer, it’s not like you’d hear my anyway.

For those who ARE willing to admit that they enjoy music, AND movies, why not listen to an album that plays like both music AND a movie? That’s an easy question to answer, there’s absolutely NO reason not to, not a single one… Except, maybe you don’t have an hour and a half to devote to an album the way you would to watching Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo for the 12th time… If that’s the case, I can’t help you, but I can suggest a couple of great stand alone tracks to throw on your next iPod mix that may get you in the mood to give this full album a listen so you can fully experience the tale of New York born Rael on his quest to save his brother, and himself from a lifetime of captivity in a strange new world…

· The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway- The album’s title track has been covered many, many times throughout prog-rock history, but the original Peter Gabriel vocal stylings just can’t be reproduced. Aside from being the best for stand alone listening, this track also gives you a good intro to what the rest of the album is all about, and it’s under 5 minutes, that’s shorter than most prog-rock Moog solos…

· In The Cage- So when you think Genesis, you may think of soft-pop ballads like Invisible Touch, Hold On My Heart, or Taking It All Too Hard. While you wouldn’t be totally wrong, there was a time in which Genesis was more rock than pop, and that time was called the 70’s… Few tracks capture this hard edge quite like In The Cage. Think more organ and guitar that synthesizer and tambourine on this one…

· The Colony of Slippermen: The Arrival/A Visit to the Doktor/The Raven- At some point, if you’re going to give prog-rock a shot, you’re going to have to listen to a epic story song broken into multiple parts. You could go with Jethro Tull’s 45 minute long Thick as a Brick, or you could stick with Pete and the boys and enjoy 8 minutes learning about the land of the Slippermen… Your reaction will likely lie someplace between ‘vaguely rockin’ and ‘man those dudes were high’. Either, and both are appropriate responses, and a pretty good summary of what prog-rock is all about.

2. Dream Theater- A Change Of Seasons
Now that you’ve been baptized into prog-rock glory, maybe you’re thinking ‘I’m all about living in the past, but that album is like, 33 years old… Isn’t there something just a LITTLE bit newer out there?’ Yes, yes Internet, there is most certainly something just a little bit newer out there. 20 years newer to be exact. 1995 brought us a prime textbook example of prog-rock greatness in the form of Dream Theater’s A Change of Seasons. Don’t believe me? Let’s just say the album is over an hour long, but only contains 5 tracks…

A Change Of Seasons- The opening title track is a seven part medley that clocks in at roughly 23 minutes, but don’t be intimidated, it breaks up nicely for listening, and there is no Iron Butterfly-esque 15 minute guitar solo or 3 minute long drum interlude to be found. The All Music Guide Review calls this track ‘one of the most impressive pieces of music ever written in the progressive metal vein.’ I personally feel that might be a bit overstated, but if you’re going to pass judgement on prog-rock one way or the other, you should give this track a listen. If you enjoy it, you’re probably going to enjoy a good number of other prog-rock tunes. If you don’t enjoy it, this is not the genre for you…

The other 4 tracks on the album are progged-up cover tunes of 70’s standards that in many ways are superior to the originals, if nothing else, because they blend together so well with other era hits. The Big Medley is a welcome addition to any classic-rock themed iTunes playlist, as long as you’re not loathe to include modern cover tunes in with classic originals. I’m of two minds on this topic. For the most part I avoid modern covers like a zombie plague, but I make a few exceptions, and one of them is for Dream Theater.

3. Pink Floyd- The Wall
People who like Pink Floyd, but do not like Yes tend to refuse to accept that Pink Floyd is prog-rock. People who like Yes and do not like Pink Floyd tend to agree. People who fall into either of these categories are hopelessly wrong. I fully agree that Pink Floyd and Yes are not the same band… I would go so far as to say if Yes opened for Pink Floyd, they may get beer bottles tossed at them until they stop just 6 minutes into Roundabout and are forced to leave the stage. Just like modern rock fans can enjoy The Killers and find The Strokes too studio enhanced and ‘posery’, prog-rock fans can enjoy the hard edged sulk of Pink Floyd’s epic coming of age in repressive Britain tale so succinctly captured in The Wall without owning your very own Lonely Heart.

If you’re not familiar with The Wall, I suggest changing that through the album, rather than the film. There’s nothing wrong with the film per-se, but I feel the imagery and magnified story telling for someone who has not already formed their own opinions about the music tends to push people into a particular direction that may not be the same as they direction they would naturally gravitate to with just the music alone. This belief is not specific to this album, or even to the genre of music vs. film. I tend to think the same is true of film adaptations of books. If nothing else, give the original media a chance to take hold before seeing what someone else’s vision is of it…

4. Side 2 of Abbey Road- The Beatles
By invoking the spirit of Floyd I came dangerously close to losing my ‘Prog-Rock Fan’ membership card, by bringing up The Beatles final recording, I’ve more or less set it on fire. I chose Abbey Road not as a means of labeling The Beatles a Prog-Rock band, but as an educational tool to show where the idea for an epic storied prog-rock album came from. The second side of Abbey Road has been cited by a litany of artists as influential musical story telling and was in my opinion a necessary step toward the prog-rock albums of the 70’s and beyond.

From Because through Her Majesty, The Beatles intertwine 9 separate tracks without a break in the music. In addition to the tracks running together, the same chords and tunes pop up throughout the ensemble, and even characters cross from one song to the next (we first meet Polythene Pam half way through Mean Mr. Mustard). Had this album been released during the prog-rock heyday of the mid 70’s, these individual songs likely would have been billed as one track, or course had this album not been released in 1969, prog-rock as we know it likely would have never existed… Just keep in mind, if you find yourself coming to the end of She Came In Through The Bathroom Window, gearing up for Ringo’s only drum solo committed to an album, you’re more than just a Beatles fan, you’re a prog-rock fan, like it or not.

5. LTE I- Liquid Tension Experiment
Whilst prog-purists are furiously typing away slanderous comments right now, threatening to avenge my soul with their 15th level Dwarves for sullying the beauty of their commercially disasterous rock genre by acknowledging the existence of The Beatles on the prog-rock timeline, other, less… ummm… passionate readers are probably thinking to themselves ‘hey, maybe this guy has a point… Maybe prog-rock isn’t just for those who like extended synth solos and hair-metal inspired guitar work taken seriously. I might just be a prog-rock fan afterall!’

If you’re a former, type away… no press is bad press. If you’re a latter, here’s your litmus test. Liquid Tension Experiment is a prog-rock supergroup made up of John Petrucci and Mike Portnoy, long time members of Dream Theater, Jordan Rudess, a newer DT denizen, and prog-rock giant Tony Levin known mostly for his work with King Crimson… The kicker is, it’s also all instrumental.

I’m a big fan of lyrics. I tend to enjoy music based more on the substance of the lyrics than the quality of the music behind them… Case in point, currently playing on my iPod is Kim Carnes’ Bette Davis Eyes, and I’m not enjoying it because of the synth-clap background of the non-threatening drum line laid ever so quietly in the background to keep Kim on point… I’m enjoying it because all the boys think she’s a spy… ‘cause she’s got Bette Davis eyes…

LTE hits on a specific point in my brain however that is usually reserved for especially well crafted movie soundtracks. The musical coagulation formed by replacing Kevin James LaBrie’s vocals with Levin’s bass lines makes me imagine the original Star Wars trilogy, only Han Solo is played by Shaft’s Richard Roundtree and Luke Skywalker’s character is replaced by Rudy Ray Moore’s Dolemite… ‘When I see a Storm Trooper, I cut the mutha fucka…’

If this doesn’t make you want to rush out and purchased a horned helmet and head for the enchanted lands of the Nordic gods, that I don’t know what will… Just remember, prog-rock is NOT a gateway to life as a jobless slacker in a cheez-whiz stained Porcupine Tree tour shirt, unless you want it to be… Keep on rockin’ for at least 20 minutes…