Twelve Songs of Christmas

Season eight ends with what I hope will be a tradition--a Christmas party, with a few guests and a lot of music.  This week's guests include comic artist Peter Bagge, singer Judy Whitmore, and indie rock artist Hibou. Bagge is coming to New Orleans in January for the Fan Expo, and I have been a fan dating back to his NYC punk days. He's best known for the comic Hate and the young-punks-in-love adventures of Buddy Bradley and his friends. Last year, he considered how they'd grow up in Hate Revisited.  While talking, we discussed his favorite Christmas music.  I also talked to vocalist Judy Whitmore, who has also been pilot Judy Whitmore, author Judy Whitmore, and ... I'll let her explain. Her album, Christmas, flies the flag for the classic aesthetics of Christmas music. I also mention in the episode an article by April Clare Welsh at ChartMetric.com that quotes me in her piece on the way Christmas music is become sadder. Is that perhaps because the world is getting sadder?  I also featured new Christmas music from É Arenas, whose 2024 interview ran in full earlier this season. This year, he recorded a new song, "Go Santa Go," and included it with all of his holiday music on the new vinyl album, Yo Soy Tu Santa. Earlier this year, I interviewed the indie pop artist Hibou for my non-Christmas website, My Spilt Milk, but while I had him on the line, I had to ask him about Christmas music as well. Finally, I mentioned this year's Christmas Underground playlist and the streaming version of my own playlist. 

This week’s episode features two interviews—one with Grammy-winning jazz saxophone player Miguel Zenón helping us appreciate the salsa Christmas classic Asalto Navideño by Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe. Asalto Navideño was reissued on vinyl this holiday season by Craft Recordings.   The other is with music industry veterans Jonathan McHugh and Tamara Conniff, who worked together to produce A Life in Rhythm: The Ray Conniff Story about her father.  The episode also includes new Christmas music from Kristian Noel Pedersen, who appeared on the podcast earlier this season. You can find his new album, Bullshit & Gift Wrapping at his Bandcamp page. In the episode, we also hear music from the late Raul Malo of The Mavericks. I wrote about the Mavericks’ return in 2013, but never got a chance to interview Malo, whose Marshmallow World & Other Favorites is a wonderful introduction to his charms as a singer.  The episode also includes “Two XMAS” by New Fools from the New Orleans indie Christmas compilation, A Strange Daisy Christmas.  If you’d like this year’s Christmas mix, email me at [email protected]. If you have a cool mix yourself, send it or a link over. I’d love to hear it. 

We're in the last weeks before Christmas and I have more interviews than I can handle.  This week starts with a version of "Wonderful Christmas Time" by Twanguero before we get to my interview with Roland Gift, ex of Fine Young Cannibals. He talks about the way a new Chanel ad campaign with Dua Lipa and Blackpink's Jennie has introduced a new generation to the Fine Young Cannibals' "She Drives Me Crazy," and about FYC40, an compilation of the band's hits with a second disc of dance remixes.  Gift also mentions the video for "Everybody Knows it's Christmas." I follow that with Ketch Secor and Morgan Jahnig from Old Crow Medicine Show, who this year released OCMS Xmas, their first Christmas album. There's a lot of good stuff in that conversation, more than we have time for in this episode, so I'll revisit it in its entirety next season.  Finally, I talk to Lorin Sklamberg of The Klezmatics about the reissue of their album, Woody Guthrie’s Happy Joyous Hanukkah, where they added music to lyrics written by Guthrie. Here too, there's more good stuff than we had time for, so I'll return to this next conversation next season as well.  One mea culpa: The most embarrassing moment of the season comes in conjunction with this interview because on Apple Music, the song I lead into the conversation with appears as "Ny Psycho Freylekhs." I pronounced it that way, then realized when I downloaded the song after the introduction had been recorded that it was "NY" as in "New York," not "Ny" as in the end is nigh. I never feel smart staggering through other languages, but I haven't felt as dumb as I did when I saw the proper spelling. The episode ends with music by Haunted House Party from A Strange Daisy Christmas.   

We're in December now, and this week we have three conversations. William Shatner's face is on the pop culture Mt. Rushmore, and when I had a chance to interview him for The New Orleans Advocate in advance at his appearance at Pop Expo in town, I couldn't pass up the chance to ask him about 2018's Shatner Claus. It's a short interview, but I have it so you get to hear it.  The interview begins with us talking about You Can Call Me Bill, a documentary from 2023 about his life and career. The story I wrote for the Advocate deals with the way that his career has opened up opportunities for him late in life. The episode also features a new song, "I am Falling Snow," from Sara Noelle. In 2023, Sara was a guest on 12 Songs to talk about her body of Christmas music.  Jazz vocalist Jane Monheit has become well known for Christmas music with two Christmas albums and a yearly holiday season tour that will bring her to New Orleans on Sunday night.  This conversation is an edited version of a longer conversation that we'll run in its entirety next season  Finally, singer Kelly Finnigan has a new Christmas single. Earlier this season, I talked to Shawn Lee about recording "Say It Again" with soul singer Kelly Finnigan.  I first talked to Finnigan in 2020 when he released A Joyful Sound, which I consider to be a modern Christmas music classic. It sounds like a lost R&B record from the late 1960s or early 1970s with psychedelic and moody touches. We talk more about that album five years later and his new Christmas single, "I Can't Wait (for Christmas Time)."   Finally, we revisit the new A Strange Daisy Christmas, a collection of Christmas songs by members of the New Orleans indie rock community. A week or so ago I featured Loucey's "Christmas (bAbYpLeAze CoMeHoMe), and this week's show ends with The Self-Help Tapes' version of Christmas Treat." The song started as a late-in-the-show Saturday Night Live sketch that The Strokes' Julian Casablancas remade as a rock 'n' roll Christmas standard. 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) made itself part of this year's music story with AI acts The Velvet Sundown, TaTa Taktumi and Breaking Rust making news one way or another.  This week, Ken Kessler of the podcast The Sounds of Christmas and Gerry D from the Totally Rad Christmas podcast join me to talk about the way AI Christmas music foreshadowed some of this. We talk about an early effort created by University of Toronto researchers, "Rudolph the All-Gracious King" and it's companion how-it's-done video), and the heavy metal "Christmas Overdrive." We also talked about faux-vintage Christmas songs posted at the RAI Music page.