The holiday music of 2021 may not be plentiful, but there are a handful of very worthy new releases and reissues:
Christmas (Fur Peace Ranch Records) from Jorma Kaukonen is a vinyl 25th-anniversary reissue of the 1996 release. It is a Record Store Day Black Friday exclusive. This is the first time for the album on vinyl and it will only be pressed once. Quantities are limited to 2,500 on either the “Christmas Tree” color-vinyl version or the “Candy Cane” color-vinyl version and all packages come with an OBI strip. This is a rootsy take on holiday music, and sounds fresh and new 25 years later.
Fans of Jorma Kaukonen’s solo albums and work with Hot Tuna will feel right at home with the sound of this album. Kaukonen, primary Christmas collaborator Michael Falzarano and others have come up with a perfect mix of traditional holiday music fare and welcome originals, either as vocal tracks or instrumentals. Falzarano has contributed to Hot Tuna and Kaukonen solo albums since 1990, and the two have a natural music affinity. There are acoustic covers of well-known holiday classics such as “What Child Is This?” and “Silent Night,” as well as more electric fare on the original nearly 11-minute jam “Holiday Marmalade.”
This makes for a great gift for the Jorma, Hot Tuna or even Jefferson Airplane fan. Even after all these years, whether acoustic, electric, solo or with a group, Jorma Kaukonen keeps on truckin’.
Lucinda Williams has also come up with a rootsy take on holiday music. Lu’s Jukebox Vol. 5: Have Yourself a Rockin’ Little Christmas with Lucinda Williams (Highway 20 Records) is the latest album in her jukebox series of live-in-the-studio albums. Previous releases have tackled Tom Petty, Bob Dylan, Southern soul and ’60s country classics, and Vol. 6 will pay tribute to the Rolling Stones. The first-take vibe finds Williams and her band Fred Eltringham, Steve Mackey, Stuart Mathis and Joshua Grange in a gritty, no-frills setting that clicks in every way.
Recorded in Nashville, the album has a bluesy rock feel that fans of the ’60s and ’70s recordings of Bob Dylan, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers and the Rolling Stones will fall in love with. They’ve been covered countless times, but Williams and her band’s take on “Run Run Rudolph,” “Merry Christmas Baby” and “Please Come Home for Christmas” are done here with a timeless, yet new sound.
“Little Red Rooster,” the Howlin’ Wolf composition that set the template for the sound of the Rolling Stones in their seminal early-’60s blues period, is given a lyrical holiday facelift. The jazzy “I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm” is given a complete roots-rock makeover, and on the flipside is the punky “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight Tonight).” This is an album that strips away the facile veneer of some more recent Christmas music and is an instant classic.
The Manchester Orchestra are not from Manchester in England, but instead are from Atlanta, Ga. They have been slowly building a passionate following and for those uninitiated, their sound shares some of the same characteristics of other American groups such as My Morning Jacket, Fleet Foxes, Iron and Wine and Calexico. Releasing records since 2006, the group had only five albums prior to this year. One of their two releases this year is a 12-inch vinyl EP Christmas Songs Vol. 1 (Loma Vista).
The first-edition pressing is a one-sided release on red vinyl with an etching on the side with no music. Along with a short intro and outro, the group offers up six traditional Christmas music songs. The tracks have a churchy feel and are more like hymns or prayers than the typical tacky holiday music. The group is clearly devoutly Christian, but it has reclaimed the true spirituality and grace of these six songs, without sounding preachy or heavy-handed. These are heartfelt renditions filled with joy and peace.
On the group’s album from this year, The Million Masks of God (Loma Vista), the Manchester Orchestra again wears their spirituality on their sleeve, expressing the tenets of faith, hope and charity. On side one, they are also going for a rougher, edgy sound – and like, say U2, don’t proselytize, but put the emphasis on their music, first and foremost. Side 2 is more meditative and their new Christmas music EP would sound perfect after playing this album. The Manchester Orchestra is a group clearly poised to break out to a larger audience with their work from this past year.
- Vicki Peterson and John Cowsill Prepare New LP Ahead of Hall of Fame Show - August 2, 2024
- Bono, Chris Blackwell, Richard Barone + Others: Steve Matteo’s Best of 2023 Rock Books - January 19, 2024
- Inside Billy Joel’s ‘My Life, A Piano Man’s Journey’ - November 27, 2023
