And here we are at that time of season again. This has been a year of life imitating art imitating life as in the midst of attempting to assemble this playlist, I helped produce TWO separate Christmas shows, the wonderful new musical version of the iconic perennial Christmas movie A Christmas Story, and a fun salute to the 60s girl groups (which you all know is my wheelhouse), Winter Wonderettes, featuring all the old Darlene Love/Brenda Lee/Ronnettes hits and more. So having been immersed in Christmas music from all angles for the last month, it’s time to sift through the new and the carryovers on Spotify to compile the perfect Christmas playlist for the unbelievable 18th straight year. Again there’s only a few big names and a lot of independents contributing to another pretty balanced list.
The recipe for the perfect Playlist is a now a time-tested standard: select a generous helping of the best of this season, add a handful of leftovers that didn’t fit past lists, a pinch or two of current topical salutes, and a touch of the occasional novelty number, all resulting in this effort of love to my friends and followers for the holiday season.
First again: the criteria. [One new rule! And then regular readers can skip the rest of this paragraph. The old rules will never change.] The additional rule for this year—avoid “All I Want for Christmas is You” because it’s just got too much Mariah baggage all over it and she just won’t go away. She’s finally soured me on one of my contemporary favorites. Yours has to be really good to overcome all that. Now, the rest. In this analysis, points are awarded more for taking a particular selection of music and making it not only entertaining and fresh, but showing the artist one is famous for being in the interpretation–within the boundaries of the material. Also, while new original breakout singles are encouraged, the CD should be heavy on standards and classics. Plus the one you all know: under no circumstance may your CD contain a cover of “Christmas Shoes”. That is grounds not only for disqualification, but for permanent banning from all future lists. Now the results…
John Legend, A Legendary Christmas. Legend won Easter this year with his Emmy Award winning turn in Jesus Christ Superstar, and now he makes his move on Christmas, lending his velvet voice to a retro album with a unique twist. Instead of taking the standard roads of going Time Warner classic, big band, or 60s pop as most do, he compiled a clever salute to the classic 70s R&B sound (even nabbing Stevie Wonder to duo with him with harmonica on his iconic “What Christmas Means to Me”). He stands his ground with this sound right down to the packaging, a salute to a classic Andy Williams album of the day, and the cheesy TV special, a (hopefully) deliberate parody of the Williams-style “famous friends coming over to my house to visit for the season” complete with (even more hopefully) bad 70s writing (basically a one hour salute to Christmas mac and cheese??). But the CD works and plays to Legend’s vocal strengths and charisma. The concept is a little dicey when some of the arrangements are a little too 70s for the tune (“Silver Bells” suffers badly), but for the most part he hits the mark, as expected, with strong choices like a bluesy “Please Come Home for Christmas”, smooth sounds on “The Christmas Song” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”, a fun original “Bring Me Love”, and the aforementioned Stevie cover. Grade: A- (more mac, less cheese)
Jessie J, This Christmas Day. The British powerhouse strikes out with a big band and covers a nice array of standards. She fares best when using the band to her advantage on big swing versions of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”, “The Man with the Bag”, and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” (bonus points for an easily usable version of the title song here), but even the more intimate numbers pulling back on her big voice work. If there is a critique here it is not the material or the arrangements, but the order of the album. Instead of mixing back and forth between upbeat, low key, and solemn, she front loads the four biggest best swinging numbers at the top, then leaves the rest of the album to be slow burn–and significantly less fun–to the end. Truly her producers’ fault, not hers, but it does change the end effect. Recommendation is to play this one on shuffle (which may have resulted in an extra half grade). Grade: A (for the no-shuffle version)
Pentatonix, Christmas Is Here The reigning royal family of a capella trots out their third Christmas album (fifth if you count the re-released “deluxe” expanded editions they always release the following years), and they may be beginning to show their age. Always at the forefront of the genre, this effort has all the standard wrappings of their superior sound, but nothing new and innovative as they usually provide. In all fairness, last year’s expansion of their second album actually diluted the work, but it is obvious there is a huge hole in their impeccable sound from the loss of super bass Avi Kaplan, the best ever in the business. They’re still the leaders of the pack, but the rest are gaining. There just isn’t a standout track like usual. It’s all solid work, just feeling a little retreaded. Scoring best are their takes on “What Christmas Means to Me”, “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas”, “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”, and an admittedly clever “instrumental” version of The Nutracker Suite’s “Waltz of the Flowers”. The questionable arrangement is revisiting the old Barbra Streisand double-timed version of “Jingle Bells”, which even, when her highness covers it, feels entirely too precious and need not be revived by other vocal peasants. Overall, the album is not a disappointment, but they’ve done better. Maybe next years “Deluxe” edition will rectify that. Grade: B+
Levi Kreis, Home for the Holidays. Indie recording artist Kreis has dabbled to find his voice in pop, rock, and gospel, and his first Christmas outing has a little of all of those influences and other sounds. The Tennessee native adopts a little Southern jazz flair and with this enjoyable new album could be poised to be the next Harry Connick Jr. What is also on display here is Kreis’ mad piano skills, which helped contribute to his 2010 Tony Award as Best Featured Actor in a Musical portraying Jerry Lee Lewis in Million Dollar Quartet (in which he not only sang and acted but played crazy piano with his fingers, feet, and butt—a quadruple threat of sorts) and those great balls of fire-filled fingers are the best supporting feature on this CD. Kreis has the most fun on an album since the Pointer Sisters gathered in the studio to have a party recording “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” on the first Very Special Christmas CD (heard on volume 1 of this series). He’s strongest where you’d think from this description, on the upbeat selections like “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” and a slamming honky tonk piano version of “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch”, but he’s equally effective on the more introspective cuts that are basically just Kreis accompanying himself on the piano, even those closely associated as women’s songs, like “Hard Candy Christmas” from The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Joni Mitchell’s “River”, and the rarely-seen Brenda Lee Classic “Christmas is Just Another Lonely Day”. Grade: A
Ingrid Michaelson, Songs for the Season. Full disclosure: when attending a Broadway performance of Natasha, Pierre, & the Great Comet of 1812, Miss Michaelson, a replacement cast member, waited on me in the on-stage audience and served me pirogues during the preshow. Those favors may or may not positively effect her grade a hair. Michaelson is one of the freshest and most likeable talents in pop music today, and she has the perfect, clear voice and style to do a great contemporary album like recent efforts of Kelly Clarkson, Leona Lewis, or Gwen Stefani, or at least a breezy hipster album like Colbie Caillat. Oddly, yet admirably, she chooses to go full on 50s Time/Warner classic in style, arrangement, and even graphics of her album cover. Her voice is still clearly strong enough to pull it off and the overall result is still lovely, but it leaves one wishing that she could have mixed the slower, lusher ballads (like her wistful “Auld Lang Syne” or sentimental “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” with Will Chase) with some upbeat fun arrangements to show off her other side, like a great “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” (sorely absent this year from most CDs) or even picking up the pace on “White Christmas” or “Let It Snow”. The closest she comes to that potential is a very faithful to Brenda Lee version of “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”, unfortunately shared with Grace Vanderwall which dilutes her efforts. The only total misfire is an abysmal funeral dirge version of “All I Want for Christmas is You” with Leslie Odom, wasting both their talents, questioning who thought slowing that bubblegum classic down as a good idea. Micheal Buble had already proved it was disastrous when he attempted it on his 2010 album. I feel bad, as I should applaud her attempt to disassociate her performance from all the chaos and surreal bizarreness the song has unfortunately gathered over the last few years of insanity. But maybe crazy-assed Mariah was right all along and knew the song needs all the bells and whistles and dancing elves and the ring of fire she used on the Disney Parade that one year. (Don’t worry, if you’re not familiar with this harbinger of travesties to come, I repost it every Christmas Eve as a tradition.) Overall a fine piece, but one to listen to around the fire for sure, the gentler side of the holiday festivities. Grade: B+ (Half grade off for the uber-fail on “All I Want…”)
David Archuleta, Winter in the Air. The former America Idol wunderkind has heeded my call and put out his second Christmas album (thank you, David!). Nearly a decade after his 2009 Best CD Winner here, Christmas from the Heart, it’s clear what he has been doing with his time off—growing up and becoming his own creative voice. The then 17-year-old season 8 runner up (to David Cook, who I am still waiting for a Christmas rock album from, by the way) was known to be heavily under the thumb of his producers and his overbearing dad/manager). Being branded as the next Josh Groban, it’s almost as if the conversation was “Josh Groban did this kind of album last year, now you do one”, and the result was amazing considering his age and vocal maturity. But it wasn’t the album a teen should be recording, full of, exactly like Groban, heavy, lush, neo-classical arrangements of traditional hymns and carols, some even in Latin and featuring the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. That CD, like Groban’s, is a reverent, sacred tribute to the holiday, even tackling the ultimate holiday double dare of “O Holy Night” and “Ave Maria” impressively. But over the last nine years, he has shed himself of all the creative burdens of his father and producers and arrangers, clearly displayed by this lighter, breezier, more contemporary and age-appropriate style and sound, without sacrificing any of his angelic voice. If anything, he has matured beautifully into a richer, more vocally centered sound. This is the album a 20-something should be recording and he succeeds in all styles as expected. Highlights include a gentle reggae “Mary’s Boy Child”, an R&B lite “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”, and even fun, pop original track, “Christmas Every Day”. But there’s no disappointment when he goes simpler or more reverent on others like “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” or “White Christmas”. I personally would rather he’d skipped the cloying “Mary Did You Know”, but it’s the song, not his delivery. The growing and separation pains were both worth it and Archuleta’s fresh new sound is welcome on any playlist. Grade: A
Damian McGinty, This Christmas Time. The former teen component of Irish supergroup Celtic Thunder (from the age of 14) and Glee Project winner (and resulting Glee cast member) has also grown up (now 26) and branched out as a solo artist, giving us a melodic entry of pop classics with a few old standards and the occasional hymn. Releasing his album opposite Archuleta, it is tempting and easy but unfair to compare the two. McGinty doesn’t possess Archuleta’s range or clarity, but he’s a solid entry on his own. He’s matured into a smooth baritone and sounds equally as good on the carols like “Silent Night” (complete with the classic Celtic Thunder arrangement and alternative Gaelic lyrics) as he is on the pop like “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)”. (Thank you, Damian for giving me the one cover I needed this year for that.) His original track “Dance With Me (This Christmas Time)” is a nice addition, even though it seems oddly ripped straight from the theme from Full House. Not so much the Irish David Archuleta they want to package him as, his former fangirls will nonetheless be satisfied. As we are here. Grade A-
The Mavericks, Hey! Merry Christmas! and Old 97s, Love the Holidays. Lumped these two together because they’re basically identical reviews. Two rockabilly bands with a fun collection of standards and occasional originals, mostly upbeat, nothing too edgy or innovative, just dependable and easy on the ears. Both original title songs are fun additions. They’ll get lost in the big marketed albums but at least merit a look. Grades: B+ for each
The Monkees, Christmas Party. When expected releases were teased early on in the fall, this was one of the most anticipated. The Monkees were a completely insane, non-pretentious, fun, fabricated American knock-off of the Beatles, put together by TV executives for a madcap TV show (a late-60s precursor to Big Time Rush). And in their own charming way, the guys developed a sound and a following with American teens watching their parents’ TVs. In the 40 years following, John and George are tragically gone, but Paul McCartney is still turning out thousand-dollar-a-ticket stadium tours, and they even let Ringo make the occasional guest appearance in movies and such. Sadly, heartthrob lead singer Davy Jones has passed, and surviving members Mickey Dolenz, Peter Tork, and Michael Nesmith have not aged well. Their sound is weak and uncentered and nothing reminiscent of what their fans will expect. To their credit, and personal detriment, they have included a few never-before-released tracks featuring Jones posthumosly on lead which just remind the listener what they are missing. If this album is the titular party, let’s just say I’ll cry if I want to. Grade: D
Martina McBride, It’s the Holiday Season. With her third holiday album of the decade, McBride takes a different turn. Her previous have been a nice, gentle blend of standards and hymns, all handled appropriately by McBride, who has one of the easiest voices to listen to in country music. This year she tries her hand at a crossover big band sound like Brett Eldridge did a few years ago with equal success. Trouble is she picked the same year as Jessie J to try the switch and Miss J uses the style better to her big vocal advantage. While suffering a tad in overall comparison, it could be said that McBride is however more convincing and more genuine on the smaller numbers. Grade: B+
Norm Lewis, The Norm Lewis Christmas Album. A late entry in the game, this was a highly anticipated album. Up front, Lewis is one of the most talented and highly respected actors on the New York theatre scene, a soaring, charismatic baritone with impeccable technique and performance skills. Then this album dropped and the playlist was revealed, and it’s wreck. First off, a full on eight of the eighteen tracks are not remotely Christmas songs (nine if you count “My Favorite Things”, which I do)—“Bring Him Home”? (not about the Baby Jesus out of town in Bethlehem) “Where is Love”? (not about the lack of Christmas spirit) “Home” from The Wiz? (despite a “When I think of all those loved ones I can’t be with over the holidays…”, not about that at all) But Marvin Gaye’s sexed-up “What’s Going On” and Peggy Lee’s over-sexed-up “Fever”?! What the hell, Norm Lewis?! Even some of the holiday cuts are jacked up, like the total fail of “Santa Baby” that Michael Bublé belly flopped with on his classic CD. To all gentlemen in the future: If you want to record Santa Baby, you can’t take the easy Bro way cop-out. “Santa Buddy”? “With some decorations bought at Ma-a-cy’s”?? “Forgot to mention one little thing—ka-ching! And I don’t mean a loan”??!? For real!! Here’s how this song works: When a woman sings “Santa Baby”, she has to be pretty much Jessica Rabbit slinking around on top of a piano in a red sequin dress. If you as a guy choose to sing it, you have no choice but to bite the bullet and gay it the hell up to the point of ridiculousness. It can be nothing less than Peter Allen in leopard skin lame pants shimmying on top of the same piano, preferably played by Liberace. Guys, can we just leave this song to Ann-Margret and your local gay men’s choir from now on? Lord……So sorry, Norm, love you, respect you, but this, all solid recordings vocally, is a tragic mess as a holiday album of any persuasion. Grade: Zero; DISQUALIFIED
MOST DISAPPOINTING CD 2018
The Monkees, the first album previewed in early November, had a lock on this from the beginning. The whole album was conceived and recorded in disappointment, and the new tracks used featuring Davy Jones only magnified that. But then at 11:00, Norm Lewis showed up with his “hold my beer” collection of every song under the sun. As if his entire Broadway cabaret playlist wasn’t enough, it was the preaching the social injustices at the end of the already abysmal “What’s Going On” that solidified tanking it. Enough. If I wanted socially relevant preaching, I’d log onto Facebook. Can’t a brother just listen to 45 minutes of Christmas music without getting bombarded with everything wrong in the world today? What you had here was two great albums, but one colossal mess slamming them together. Please try again, Norm. Just follow the rules next time.
BEST OVERALL CD 2018
This was another year of stewing over the best of the best, with no real jump-outs like the Kelly Clarkson, Leona Lewis, or the return of the Hanson years. And all the leading contenders were well done and vocally enjoyable.
Early favorite John Legend just staggered a bit adhering to his chosen sound, particularly the odd Barry White-ish “Silver Bells”, and the bizarre “Purple Snowflakes”. (Again, just because a song is about snowflakes doesn’t make it about Christmas. Especially purple ones.)
Jessie J put together a nice album, but she loses steam as it goes on, especially selecting overly slow renditions of “Winter Wonderland” to accomodate Boyz II Men (aside, they’ve been in the business over 25 years, shouldn’t they just be “Men” now?) and the just plain weird “Rudolph/Jingle Bells” mashup that goes from odd to utterly unnecessary.
2009 Winner David Archuleta was a welcome return with his angelic voice and youthful charm in a very different offering than before, and there are no critiques to counter his efforts.
But after hours and HOURS of listening to all the contenders back to back for days in a row, The BEST CD of 2018 goes off the board with indie artist Levi Kreis’ Home for the Holidays. There is not one misfire song, even the dicey ones like “River” and “Hard Candy Christmas” that should almost certainly have been. But the main difference here is that, face it, most Christmas albums these days seem like a planned out career move, the next business venture. One can hear Jessie J’s management telling her, “It’s time for you to get in on the Christmas game. You can be bigger than Mariah.” Or Legend sitting down with the brass at NBC thinking, “You were hot at Easter. We’ll give you a solo special at Christmas if you coordinate a CD to co-market.” Even Archuleta seemed like an artist who wanted another opportunity to do his album, not his management’s. Kreis, with a budget miniscule to all of them just seems to want to do it and is obviously having a blast from the first track to the last. Plus he gets bonus points for double duty on the accompaniment, which actually connects him closer to the music than the studio artists. Kreis takes chances with his selections and they all pay off. This is the holiday party CD of the season, and that party seems to genuinely start in the room where Kreis and his fraction-of-a-million dollar quartet gathered to jam and record. Maybe we’ll be lucky enough for him to gather the band back together for the new tradition of a follow-up expanded Deluxe edition next year. Please, Levi, take that under consideration.
So after all the effort and tedious analysis, I give you Mark’s Christmas Playlist 2018 (in order to be played, not by merit):
ROCKIN’ AROUND THE CHRISTMAS TREE 2018
(AND a new option, for those followers who used to search the music of interest out after reading in the past, follow me on Spotify, and you can hear it all on playlist “Christmas 18”. I’m attempting to put past playlists together over the holidays.)
1) ROCKIN’ AROUND THE CHRISTMAS TREE (Jessie J)—Jessie does it right, with a big band swinging sound. One of the few so good that it’s the title song and the lead off number.
2) WHAT CHRISTMAS MEANS TO ME (John Legend)—This was the perfect selection for Legend to record. And nabbing Stevie to accompany him on the harmonica was a big score.
3) WINTER WONDERLAND (Hanson)—The brothers’ winning album last year was strong enough to draw a few good alternates for the next few years.
4) I WISH IT COULD BE CHRISTMAS EVERYDAY (Kylie Minogue)—A cut from her expanded “Snow Queen Edition” of her 2015 Kylie Christmas. Had she released it with the original, the initial grade would have been higher.
5) ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS YOU (Levi Kreis)—Not that one. The other one. And it’s good.
6) IT’S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS (Pentatonix)—The most reminiscent of the original cast. Had high hopes that if they ever recorded this they would counter it with the original melody “Pine Cones and Holly Berries”. (I only have two recordings of it ever, Rockapella in 2002 and Donnie and Marie from whenever.) Sadly they too failed me. Good cut nonetheless.
7) PLEASE COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS (98˚)—This would have made the cut for them last year except Hanson put out a better one. Earned the spot this year (which probably means Kreis or Legend gets the song in 2019)
8) ALL ALONE AT CHRISTMAS (Darlene Love)—If Bing Crosby is the King of Christmas, Darlene Love is the undisputed Queen. Her second biggest holiday hit, a 2002 sequel to her iconic “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” was re-released on a complation. Miss Love will always have a spot on this list any year she wants one.
9) BRING ME LOVE (John Legend)—Legend lands a fun original cut here with a Motown-reminiscent sound that suits his voice so well. Even the video with Kristie on his head-scratching Christmas special was fun.
10) I WANNA KISS YOU SO (Girls Aloud)—The second best cut from their complementary holiday offering last year that’s getting airplay this year.
11) MARY’S BOY CHILD (David Archuleta)—Archuleta is like Josh Groban and can sing the alphabet and make this list, but his arrangement here fits his new, more mature voice perfectly.
12) YOU’RE A MEAN ONE, MR. GRICH (Levi Kreis)—Kreis has a blast slamming the honky tonk piano up against the wall and showing off his Tony winning golden fingers as well as his voice.
13) CALIFORNIA CHRISTMAS (the Cast of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend)—Always looking for a good novelty song and a good tribute to the year. Rachel Bloom’s groundbreaking series Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, which has done more for musical theatre than any TV series since Glee, comes to an end this year, so here’s a salute of thanks with a typically funny track from their season 1 mid-season Christmas finale.
14) FELIZ NAVIDAD (Gwen Stefani)—A good version of a rarely recorded song. I’ve been begging for a Latino artist to record it, but ever since since Feliciano debuted it, Ricky Martin, Marc Anthony, Gloria Estefan, J-Lo, and the rest have all dropped the ball. As surprisingly did David Archuleta this year, even though he released a shorter version of the album completely in Spanish. But he’s so good and gave us so much other good music he gets a break. In the meantime, I’ll take what I can get by an Italian girl.
15) CHRISTMAS (BABY PLEASE COME HOME) (Damian McGinty)—The only artist who recorded the song this year. Jessie J, you failed me here. This single track in the style of your bigger numbers would probably have won you the title.
16) CHRISTMAS WILL BE JUST ANOTHER LONELY DAY (Levi Kreis)—No one has ever recorded Brenda Lee’s other famous Christmas song to my knowledge, so while not one of the showier tracks on his album, it was different and gives a nice flow to the playlist.
17) ROCKIN’ AROUND THE POLE (the Hot Elves)—I had already committed the novelty slot to the Crazy Ex- crew above when at 11:00 the Hot Elves (a/k/a the Plastics from the hilarious Broadway hit version of Mean Girls, which we saw for Hayley’s birthday this year, so, topical too) dropped this full version of the song they use in the “Jingle Bell Rock” spot in the musical, which is not on the cast recording. Thank you Cady (Erika Henningsen), Gretchen (Ashley Park), Karen (Kate Rockwell), and Queen Bee Regina George (Taylor Louderman) for this unexpected, perfect, and oh so fetch Christmas gift.
18) GOD REST YE MERRY GENTLEMEN (David Archuleta)—Archuleta puts his new contemporary spin updating the Bare Naked Ladies version with great results.
19) SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN (Jessie J)—She leads off with this fun upbeat big band rendition. It also makes a nice last hurrah before heading towards the more solemn close of this playlist.
20) SILENT NIGHT (Jordan Smith)—Smith’s velvet take on this gorgeous hymn deserves revisiting last year’s CD
21) O HOLY NIGHT (Peter Hollens & Jamie Grace)—Hollens held this song alone in 2016 with a breathtaking single release, but added Grace on his album release last year. The solo version is superior, but at least this offers a chance to hear Hollens’ sublime voice. He at least wisely saves all the important big notes for himself.
22) I’LL BE HOME FOR CHRISTMAS (Josh Groban)— I had the pleasure to see Groban with Idina Menzel this fall. The last 2018 tribute and a beautiful way to close the playlist with the re-released radio version of this cut from his classic album.
(All selections available for preview or purchase at Amazon.com and iTunes, and available through Spotify)
To access the playlist through Spotify, follow me and go to Christmas 18, or use the link below: