It can be tough to get a handle on just how popular certain classic Christmas singles really were in their time, compared to all the other records on the radio in the same season. Billboard’s erratic policy of charting Christmas singles—sometimes on a separate chart and sometimes not—meant that certain perennials like “Happy Xmas (War Is Over), “Feliz Navidad,” and “Snoopy’s Christmas” never ran the big chart, even though they racked up sales and airplay numbers that certainly would have qualified them. Fortunately for geeks, Billboard’s competitor Cash Box maintained no such segregation. I explored the Cash Box charts for December and January from 1960 through 1986, and I could give you the whole laundry list of chart positions and dates, which would be interesting only to me (and maybe to our friend Yah Shure). Instead, here are the highlights.

What About Those Perennials? “Snoopy’s Christmas” by the Royal Guardsmen is, by the accounting of Cash Box, one of the top holiday singles of the rock era. It charted on December 9, 1967, and rose as high as Number 10 on the chart dated December 30, but plunged entirely out of the top 100 after that. Some others:

• In 1970, “Feliz Navidad” by Jose Feliciano charted for just one week (December 26, 1970).
• John and Yoko’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)” hit the Cash Box chart the week of December 18, 1971, at Number 63, peaked at Number 36 during the week of January 1, 1972, then dropped off.
• Elton John’s “Step Into Christmas” lasted but two weeks on the chart, entering on December 22, 1973, and peaking at Number 56 the next week.
• “I Believe in Father Christmas” by Greg Lake also spent two weeks on the Cash Box chart, peaking at Number 92 for the week of January 3, 1976.
• The Eagles’ “Please Come Home for Christmas” reached Number 29 for the week of January 13, 1979—a position lower than it achieved in Billboard, where it peaked at 18.
• Paul McCartney’s “Wonderful Christmastime” made Number 83 for the week of January 12, 1980.

What Songs Charted Highest? Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas” reached Number 7 during the week of January 19, 1985. The next highest after “Snoopy’s Christmas” is Roy Orbison’s “Pretty Paper,” which peaked at Number 16 on the chart dated January 4, 1964.  A couple of holiday songs post-1963 just nicked the Cash Box Top 40: “Merry Christmas Darling” by the Carpenters (41, 12/21/70)  and “When a Child Is Born” by Michael Holm (39, 1/18/75). Nilsson’s “Remember (Christmas)” did too, hitting Number 40 on 1/27/73), although it’s not particularly Christmassy apart from the parenthetical title. (The early 60s are anomalous compared to the rest of the period I’m discussing, so we’ll leave the rest of the songs from that period for later on.)

Notice Anything Weird? For three straight years—1983, 1984, and 1985—”Kid Santa Claus” by Patsy scraped into the top 100, never doing better than 92. It’s about Santa’s daughter, Holly Nicole, and how she rescues her father from smog-shrouded Los Angeles in time to make his Christmas rounds. The song’s creator apparently signed a full round of licensing deals for 1984, and she filed at least one lawsuit claiming her copyright was infringed by somebody else’s merchandise. Another song I’d never heard, the rather tasty “25th of Last December” by Roberta Flack, spent five weeks on the chart at Christmas 1977, although it never got above Number 92. In 1965, “There Won’t Be Any Snow (Christmas in the Jungle)” by Derrik Roberts peaked at Number 77 on Christmas Day; it’s a spoken-word recording from a soldier in Vietnam, sending holiday greetings home.

So What About the Early 60s? As I dug deeper in time from 1986, I found just one or two holiday records on the chart each year. Then I hit 1963 and the number ballooned. That year, no less than eight holiday singles charted in December and January.

• Orbison’s “Pretty Paper” was the biggest, followed by “The Marvelous Toy” by the Chad Mitchell Trio.
• Two other songs that haven’t been off the radio since also charted that year: “Do You Hear What I Hear” by Bing Crosby, which got to Number 66, and “Little Saint Nick” by the Beach Boys, which got to Number 69. (Unless I’m mistaken—always a possibility—”Do You Hear What I Hear?” was the final chart record of Crosby’s magnificent career.)
• Also charting in 1963: “You’re All I Want for Christmas” by Brook Benton, Allan Sherman’s “The Twelve Gifts of Christmas,” and a version of “White Christmas” by Andy Williams.
• The Harry Simeone Chorale’s original recording of “The Little Drummer Boy” was back on the chart that year for a single week; it had charted every year since its original release in 1957.

Re-entries were common in the early 60s. Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” first hit in 1960 and reached Number 22; it returned to the Cash Box chart in 1961 and 1962. Charles Brown’s “Please Come Home for Christmas” scraped on in 1960 and again in 1961. David Seville’s “The Chipmunk Song,” which had done four weeks at Number One in 1958 and early ‘59, re-entered in 1959, 1961 and 1962.  A new version of “Jingle Bell Rock” by Chubby Checker and Bobby Rydell charted in 1961 and came back for 1962; in 1962, the Bobby Helms original recharted as well. And even Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas,” which had first appeared in 1942, got back on the Cash Box chart in both 1961 and 1962.

And maybe earlier, but I stopped with 1960 because the whole project was starting to make my head hurt.

I guess I gave you a laundry list of chart positions and dates after all. Accept it in the Christmas spirit, then, and have a nice day.

“25th of Last December”/Roberta Flack (buy Roberta’s Christmas album here; I’m not sure if the version of this song on that album is the same one that hit the radio in 1977, which is from the splendidly titled Blue Lights in the Basement; get that here)

It’s just another day in our hall-decked-but-still-essentially-random universe, wherein I pull out my whole laptop Christmas library, throw it in the air, and see what comes down first. Look out below.

“A Warm Little Home on a Hill”/Stevie Wonder. A charming holiday scene in waltz time. Like many of the original Christmas songs concocted by Motown songwriters, it flirts with terminal sappiness, but there’s something about Wonder’s delivery that keeps it from the edge of the ledge.

“The Mistletoe and Me”/Isaac Hayes. From a Stax compilation dated 1982, which features two versions of the great “Santa Claus Wants Some Lovin’,” by Mack Rice and Albert King, plus the Staple Singers’ “Who Took the Merry out of Christmas?,” all three of which have more going on than this holiday bedroom ballad.

“Kitty Cats Christmas”/Leon Redbone. Before the world was baffled by Bob Dylan’s Christmas album, I was baffled by Leon Redbone’s. (It occurs to me, however, that bafflement is part of the reaction Redbone means to provoke. Dylan, too.) Christmas Island was released in 1987 and reissued in 2003 with “Kitty Cats Christmas” as a bonus track. Despite the presence of a children’s chorus, it’s not awful.

“The Christmas Song”/Vince Guaraldi Trio. If this song is heard anywhere in A Charlie Brown Christmas, I’ve missed it the first 44 times I’ve watched the show, but I promise to pay extra-close attention the 45th time, which may be as soon as tonight.

“My Christmas Card to You”/Partridge Family. I must have known about the album A Partridge Family Christmas Card at its release in 1971, given that I was a fan of all things Partridge that year, yet I have no recollection of it. I would almost certainly have bought it if my brother didn’t, but he didn’t, and I didn’t. I recall being surprised to learn of it, which wasn’t until I saw it in a used bin at some point during the 1980s. (Did I buy it then? Hell and yes.) Partridge Family records were always heaped with sugar, but their Christmas album is especially sugary. If you’ve got a high tolerance for that sort of thing, “My Christmas Card to You” probably won’t hurt you.

“Swingin’ Silent Night”/Asleep at the Wheel. Lots of artists become paralyzed in the face of certain Christmas songs—afraid to mess with them and therefore, incapable of bringing anything new to them. The thing about “Silent Night” is that it’s both simple enough and beautiful enough to withstand new approaches, like the Western swing take of Asleep at the Wheel, recorded in 1997.

“Christmas Blues”/Canned Heat. Cut as a single sometime in the late 60s, “Christmas Blues” has appeared as a bonus track on a couple of different Canned Heat re-releases, and it’s been anthologized quite a bit. What hasn’t been anthologized quite so much is “Christmas Boogie,” which features a guest appearance by Alvin and the Chipmunks. I shit you not.

“O Holy Night”/Green Pajamas. The Green Pajamas are the living embodiment of indie: 20-some albums in 25 years and never a major-label deal. They cut their gorgeous version of “O Holy Night” in 2006, and it’s become a Christmas essential around my house.

“Christmas Time”/Jimmy McCracklin. Like Charles Brown, Jimmy McCracklin left the South (St. Louis, actually) for California after World War II and found his place in the blues scene out there. The only release date I can find for “Christmas Time” is 1961, but it sounds older than that.

“Little Drummer Boy”/Duke Pearson. From Merry Ole Soul, another of the classic Blue Note albums produced and engineered by Rudy Van Gelder, whose studio was actually in his house. The album is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and it would be a fine candidate for Blue Note’s ongoing series of remastered reissues. It’s a keeper.

“Swingin’ Silent Night”/Asleep at the Wheel (buy it here)
“O Holy Night”/Green Pajamas (I don’t know if you can get this or not; the band’s website is here)

(This is the 1000th post in the history of this blog. A thousand posts seems like both a great accomplishment and a frightening waste of time. The following is adapted from a post I wrote at my first blog, the Daily Aneurysm, in 2005.)

Whenever we visit the in-laws over Christmas, we always go to church on Christmas Eve. On the list of my life’s annoyances, this is a minor one. Christmas Eve service was a significant part of the family ritual when I was a kid, and spending time with my niece and nephews, no matter where it is, is rarely wasted. So despite my irreligious opinions, I go along without making an issue of it. A choir and congregation cranking up the classic seasonal hits in a decorated church on Christmas Eve can be enjoyed for purely aesthetic reasons having nothing to do with religion.

But there’s another kind of music that’s largely absent from church services anymore—the music of language. That music began growing fainter 40 years ago, when I was a kid, as the Revised Standard Version and other translations of the Bible began to replace the old-school King James Version. But the church I grew up in still used King James on special occasions, such as Christmas, and I used to be able to recite the KJV Christmas story from memory. (It may have helped to hear Linus do it every year on A Charlie Brown Christmas.)

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

It’s probably not true that Shakespeare was one of the translators who worked on the KJV, but that only means his way with language must have been in England’s air during the early 1600s. And not just devices like rhythm and meter—the word choices are poetic, too. The reference (in an earlier verse not quoted here) to Mary being “great with child” was a word-picture I could understand even before I knew where babies came from, because I could remember how my own mother looked before my youngest brother was born. I also remember being fascinated by the term “swaddling clothes,” and my kid’s mind translated it into a picture of a loving mother wrapping a baby in a big white blanket, as the translators surely intended us to do.

Compare that to the New Revised Standard Version’s telling of the same tale, the one used by the Lutherans with whom I’ve kept Christmas the last few years:

In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!”

In this translation, a supernatural visitation from heavenly messengers in the hills of Galilee becomes mere incident. “Shepherds living” might be a more accurate translation of the original than “shepherds abiding,” but “abiding” has an emotional impact “living” cannot match—it connotes endurance and duty, and patiently watching through the long night, night after night. It’s not just a job, shepherding, it’s a calling, and to say that they’re merely “living” is to make their shepherding into just one aspect of broader lives. For the sake of the story, they don’t need broader lives. And when the peace of that night—of the abiding shepherds’ entire existence up to that point—is shattered by the mindblowing appearance of singing angels, wouldn’t you expect the angels to have better material than “on earth peace among those whom he favors”? And as for the sentence, “You will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth,” well, “bands of cloth” would get red-penciled in a seventh-grade creative writing class. Compared to the KJV’s story, the NRSV version is a weather report. There’s no majesty, no mystery, and worst of all, during the most musical season of the year, not a note of music.

Although the KJV was supposed to bring the word of God down to a level the average person of the 17th century could understand, the time and place in which it was created, its stylistic influence on generations of English writers, and its 400-year-long endurance as the definitive word have made it a cornerstone of English literature. I’m no expert, but it seems to me that it better embodies the majesty and mystery the Christian God is supposed to have than any other text, and it inspires the awe that Christians are supposed to display before him. To me, this is where succeeding translations fail: Just as no man is a hero to his valet, perhaps God can’t really be God if he talks to you like everyone else does.

At Popdose Today: Another edition of One Day in Your Life.

“You Angel You”/Manfred Mann’s Earth Band (buy it here)

Willie Nelson had enjoyed one of the biggest hits of his career in 1978 and 1979 with Stardust, his collaboration with producer Booker T. Jones. It went to Number One on the country album chart and Number 30 pop, and contained three monster hit singles. But all that success did not buy Willie any time off. I was just starting out in country radio at the time, and I was struck by how quickly country artists churned out product in those days. Artists would go three singles deep on an album and wham, release another one almost immediately, two or even three a year. (This frequently resulted in precisely the quality-control problem you might expect.)

And so in early 1979, Willie released a collaboration with Leon Russell called One for the Road. His former label, RCA, released a cash-in compilation called Sweet Memories. And on November 18, Nelson released two albums simultaneously: Willie Nelson Sings Kris Kristofferson, which features nearly all of the songs for which Kristofferson is best known, and Pretty Paper, a Christmas album. Roy Orbison had hit with “Pretty Paper” in 1963, but Willie had written it, so it was a natural choice for the album’s title song. It was also a natural choice for Willie and his band to collaborate once again with Jones, who brought the Stardust vibe to the new project.

It’s a measure of the combined artistry of Willie and Booker T that even the most hackneyed of holiday warhorses, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Jingle Bells,” have their own unique flavor. “Silent Night” begins with a ghostly organ that’s the sound of starlight (stardust, maybe?) shining over a snowy landscape—for years, I used it as background music for Christmas legal IDs at my radio stations. And the medley of “O Little Town of Bethlehem” and “Christmas Blues” is the most perfect album-closing track this side of “A Day in the Life.” The album runs less than 30 minutes, but they’re 30 good minutes.

Pretty Paper isn’t an album to whip out when the Christmas party starts to smokin’. The title song is, after all, about a homeless man on a sidewalk—not exactly typical holiday fare—and the whole album has a somber feel. If you’re plugged into Willie and Booker T.’s vision, that’s not a problem, because Christmas itself never comes without a ration of somber moments. I’m not talking about the years when everything’s shot to hell, the first Christmas after Dad lost his job or Mom ran off with the mailman. I’m talking about those somber moments that happen even in the midst of plenty and joy, when we’re reminded of loved ones who are gone, or we note the swift passage of time in our own lives, or we recall particularly memorable Christmases that we’d like to live in forever. (Maybe that’s just me, but I don’t think so.) There’s no holiday album that does better at capturing the quiet moments of reflection amidst the tinsel and glitter of Christmas than Pretty Paper.

“Silent Night”/Willie Nelson (buy it here)

Every once in a while the universe smiles upon us, and we get a week that’s filled with musical goodness such that in years to come, we can hardly believe it was real. Six years ago, Eric Boehlert, then writing for Salon, called the week of December 20, 1969, “the greatest week in rock history.” A year later, I cast a vote for the first week in November 1976. (Number of regular readers surprised that I’d pick a week in 1976: zero.) The other day I thought of another one: the week of December 9, 1972. If there was a greater week for R&B in the 1970s, you’ll have to tell me when it was.

It wasn’t perfect: “I Am Woman” by Helen Reddy hit Number One in Billboard that week, and while her song of liberated womanhood satisfied certain souls, it’s not what we’re talking about here. Gilbert O’Sullivan’s terminally white babysitting tale “Clair” was at Number Nine. But most of the rest of the Top 10 belonged not merely to R&B, but to several of the finest R&B records of the 70s, if not all time.

2. “Papa Was a Rolling Stone”/Temptations (down from 1). An epic, in several different ways. Running almost 12 minutes in its original album configuration, the single ran 6:58, although some radio stations made their own shorter edits. In any form, it’s the Platonic ideal of “hypnotic.” One of the most arresting intros ever devised keeps you around just to hear Dennis Edwards sing “It was the third of September/that day I’ll always remember,” which keeps you around for the rest of the story, even though you’ve heard it a million times before.

3. “If You Don’t Know Me By Now”/Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes (up from 5). Was there ever a record on which a singer sounded more anguished and desperate than Teddy Pendergrass does here? This is what it means to rage against the dying of the light. Here’s a lip-synched performance from Soul Train:

4. “I Can See Clearly Now”/Johnny Nash (down from 3). Nash, born in Houston, scored some modest hits in the States in the late 50s, including “The Teen Commandments,” preachy advice for the kiddies recorded with Paul Anka and George Hamilton IV. He became a reggae star in Jamaica in the mid 60s and took “Hold Me Tight” into the stateside Top 10 in 1968 before hitting with “I Can See Clearly Now.” Probably the least monumental record on the list, it nevertheless did a month at Number One.

5. “You Ought to Be With Me”/Al Green (up from 7). Another practically perfect Memphis soul record from the Reverend Al, it features the Memphis Horns—who sound otherworldly good—and drummer Al Jackson of Booker T and the MGs.

6. “Me and Mrs. Jones”/Billy Paul (up from 13). The definitive Philadelphia soul ballad, elegant and sexy and even a little bit sad. The backing track, played by MFSB, is filled with notes and figures that linger, just as lovers might linger at the end of a furtive rendezvous, knowing it’s time to part but unwilling to break away. (Or so I’m told.)

1o. “I’m Stone in Love With You”/Stylistics (up from 11). This tune came up briefly about a month ago, so I won’t say much more about it here, except to suggest that if Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff are in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, then songwriter/producer Thom Bell ought to be there, too.

Also in the Top 40 during that December week of ‘72: “I’ll Be Around” by the Spinners at Number 18, Curtis Mayfield’s “Superfly” at 22, “Keeper of the Castle” by the Four Tops at 25, and Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition” at 32. Lurking further down in the Hot 100:

• Rod Stewart’s “Angel” (a convincing simulation of an R&B ballad) at 43
• The Isley Brothers’ “Work to Do” at 51
• “992 Arguments” by the O’Jays at 57
• “Why Can’t We Live Together” by Timmy Thomas at 62
• “The World Is a Ghetto” by War at 71

I am past being upset when people make fun of the music of the 1970s, except maybe when I think about weeks like this. You can’t dismiss a decade that resulted in such glorious stuff. Sure, a hater could dwell on “I Am Woman” and “Clair,” but neither of them really affects the greatness of the week of December 9, 1972, any more than the presence of Bobby Sherman’s “La La La (If I Had You)” or “Groovy Grubworm” by Harlow Wilcox diminishes that great week in December 1969.

Of course, maybe it helped to be there that week in 1972, with the radio glued to your ear every possible waking hour. Thank goodness I was.

“Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone”/Temptations (album version, runs 11:46) (buy it here)

On one of my family’s home movies, taken in the late 60s or early 70s, a snowplow comes up the road toward our farm. It’s one of those big highway snowplows with a blade eight feet tall or so, and it takes the whole blade to move the snow that’s blown across the road. I think I remember riding in the car through the caverns cut by that plow, snowbanks maybe 10 feet high—although they might seem so tall because at the time, I was not.

That’s the sort of epic snowstorm people are thinking of when they say we don’t get them like we used to. But we do: Upwards of a foot is predicted for southern Wisconsin late tonight and tomorrow, and according to my journal, this will be the third year in the last four that’s seen a major snowstorm in early December, and maybe six out of the last 10.

All around the region tonight, there will be reenacted a ritual unchanged and unchanging—sundry prayers by various kids to multifarious gods that the coming snowstorm will cancel school tomorrow. That early-morning announcement (which always came from the radio back in the day because the TV was never on in the morning) was a liberation. My brother and I would have reveled in it, and we’d have been out in the snow even before Dad plowed the driveways around the house and the farm buildings. The opposite of liberation came when our school was not listed among those canceling, and we had to put on our heavy coats and boots to wait for a bus that would make us embarrassingly late for school, or might never arrive at all. When I was in high school, our school district went to something called “snow routes”—schools would be open, but buses wouldn’t run on most rural township roads. In theory, rural kids would go to a place on a state highway where they could catch the bus. In practice, we couldn’t get to the designated stops any better than the buses could get to us. Dad would fume when a snow-route day was announced. “None of these school-district people live in the country.”

Radio DJs and reporters rarely feel more immediately useful than when we’re on weather duty. It’s the only time we can be sure people are hanging on our every word. Severe summer weather tends to break quickly and last a relatively short time, but a winter siege can last for days. I was never snowed in at the station, although I know plenty of radio people who were; I’m guessing that I’d have relished it. There was a lot to do on snowstorm duty: endless lists of cancellations to read—you’d learn about clubs and organizations you never knew existed; the annual question of whether to read business closings—were they OK, given the emergency, or were they free commercials? You’d play meteorologist, you’d call the State Patrol for the road report—and when you got home, it could take you a while to come down from the high.

Barring a call to duty that I don’t expect to get, I’ll be chained to this computer tomorrow, just like always. But if you were to stop by, you’d catch me looking out the window for the snowplow, trying to decide if this storm is really like the ones we used to get when I was a kid.

Worth a Look: Classic Television Showbiz has a lengthy segment from the CBS Evening News of December 9, 1980, the day after John Lennon was murdered. And over at WNEW.com, hop aboard my turntable and “Step Into Christmas.”

“December Snow”/Moody Blues (buy it here—I mean it, go buy the thing; it’s one of the best Christmas albums I’ve ever heard)

It’s time again for a feature begun two years ago, in which I put my Christmas music stash on shuffle and we see what comes out. The list begins in an entirely predictable fashion.

“What Child Is This”/Vince Guaraldi Trio/A Charlie Brown Christmas. Fun fact about the special, which aired Tuesday night on ABC and will run again next week: two product placements for the show’s original sponsor, Coca-Cola, were edited out of the show in time for its fourth airing in 1968. In the opening, Linus goes flying while ice skating, but viewers never see him land because he crashes into a Coke sign. Later, he knocks a can off a fence with his blanket. In the original version, it was a Coca-Cola can. A short announcement at the end, wishing viewers “Merry Christmas from your local Coca-Cola bottler” was also removed.

“Please Come Home for Christmas”/Charles Brown/Blue Yule: Christmas Blues and R&B Classics. Don’t call him Charlie. Charles Brown recorded this first, in 1960, and it was famously covered by the Eagles. Other artists who’ve tackled it include Pat Benatar, James Brown, Dion, Fats Domino, the Drifters, Etta James, Aaron Neville, the Platters, various country singers, Southside Johnny (on the Home Alone soundtrack), the Three Degrees, and both Johnny and Edgar Winter.

“Silent Night”/Charlie Musselwhite/Alligator Records Christmas Collection. Theme of the post so far: all Charles all the time, apparently. This “Silent Night” is nicely done on harmonica.

“I Believe in Father Christmas”/Emerson Lake & Palmer/Works Volume 2. An atheist’s Christmas carol.

“I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day”/Harry Belafonte/Time-Life Treasury of Christmas Volume 2. I’m planning to write a whole post about this song, surprisingly dark yet at the same time undeniably hopeful. So stay tuned already.

“It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” and “Deck the Halls”/Moog Machine/Christmas Becomes Electric. Almost exactly the same vintage as Plastic Cow (1969), Christmas Becomes Electric got most of its fascination from being a Moog album at a time when the Moog synthesizer was the hottest technology going. Forty years later, it’s still a fairly pleasant listen, if you’re a particular kind of geek.

“Greensleeves”/Jimmy Smith/Organ Grinder Swing. B3 master Jimmy Smith recorded a Christmas album (Christmas Cookin’) in 1964, but the MP3 tag on this track says it’s from Organ Grinder Swing, which was released in 1965. I should probably compare the two to see if they’re the same recording, but this blog sucks, so I ain’t gonna.

“Medley” (various carols)/Living Strings/The Spirit of Christmas. Here’s an album that never gets out of the player at our house around the holidays. Two years ago I called it the greatest Christmas album of all time, and I haven’t changed my mind. This carol medley ends with a single string player (a viola, I think) playing “Silent Night,” and it’s one of the prettiest moments on the record.

“Lonely This Christmas”/Mud. This song spent a month at Number One in the UK starting just after Christmas in 1974 without charting in the States. (I wrote about it and some other British hits of 1974 here.) It’s where glam-rock meets doo-wop, but nobody wins, really.

Also: Today’s the 30th anniversary of the stampede at the Who concert in Cincinnati, in which 11 fans were killed. I’ll be writing about it at WNEW.com this weekend. It’s also the 41st anniversary of Elvis Presley’s 1968 comeback special. I wrote about that last year, and the post contains an error that’s bugged me ever since. I said that the special, which Col. Tom Parker had wanted to consist exclusively of Christmas tunes, didn’t contain a single one—but it did. A performance of “Blue Christmas,” which had been edited out originally, was restored at Parker’s insistence.

In the spirit of error, rather than posting the Elvis version, I’ll put up a different one that features some of  the whitest people in the world trying to get their doo-wop on.

“Blue Christmas”/Partridge Family (buy it here)

Usually I ease into the Christmas music every year, letting holiday songs pop up at random on the laptop in the days after Thanksgiving. Not this year—I jumped into the pool fully clothed, doing four solid hours of Christmas tunes on the radio the day after Thanksgiving, which felt like an awful lot awfully fast. But today’s December 1, so nobody can say it’s too early anymore.

There is, as usual, a variety of new holiday releases this year, although “new” is a relative term, as we’ll see in a moment. The most talked-about is Bob Dylan’s Christmas in the Heart. It’s been greeted with general head-scratching, and no wonder. In another lifetime, a Dylan Christmas album might have been sparely acoustic and as somber as a copse of bare trees, but Christmas in the Heart is neither. Most of the instrumental tracks are straight MOR that would fit the vocal stylings of everyone from Engelbert Humperdinck to Michael Bublé. Some of them include cheesy choral accompaniment. Dylan’s voice is no more than a croak. It’s an easy record to make fun of and/or hate, but I’m unwilling to do either one, and here’s why: Unlikely holiday albums succeed when the music fits the artist’s particular worldview—I’m thinking here of recent albums by Aimee Mann and Mary Chapin Carpenter—or when the music conforms to a particular artistic vision, like Willie Nelson’s classic Pretty Paper. Even though it might not seem like it, Dylan could be ticking both boxes—he’s past having to satisfy critics or explain himself, and Christmas in the Heart is an eloquent way of telling us so. Key track: “Must Be Santa,” which is utterly demented and completely fabulous.

So Dylan wins the award for Most Unlikely Artist to Do Christmas Tunes, but the first runner-up could be REO Speedwagon. Their Not So Silent Night is not going to impress anybody who’s not already a fan of REO, although it’s not always recognizable as REO since Kevin Cronin’s voice is shot. A cover of the Kingston Trio’s “White Snows of Winter” and a power-ballad version of “Angels We Have Heard on High” are decent, but the rest of it runs the gamut from unnecessary to awful. Unlike the Dylan album, it’s hard to discern REO’s point in making it, beyond a holiday cash-in.

Like ‘em or not, at least the Dylan and REO records are all new material. Many others require you to pay for stuff you may already own. Take for one example the Beach Boys’ Christmas Harmonies, which consists mostly of mono tracks from their 1964 Christmas album. It does include four additional tracks that can be considered rare, including the elusive 1974 recording “Child of Winter,” but it also includes the execrable “Santa’s Beard,” formerly the worst Christmas record in the world.

Neil Diamond’s A Cherry Cherry Christmas is largely recycled from Diamond’s early 90s Christmas albums. The title track is new, however, and awkwardly name-checks several Diamond tunes: “Wish you a very merry Cherry Cherry Christmas/And a Holly Holy holiday too/Underneath your tree may there always be/Sounds of harmony not a Song Sung Blue.” Diamond gains points for covering Adam Sandler’s “Chanukah Song,” but loses them again for changing Sandler’s “smoke your marijuana-kah” to “don’t smoke your marijuana-kah.” Michael McDonald’s up to the same thing. (Reissuing, not smoking.) This Christmas features four tracks from McD’s 2001 album but adds some new material as well. (For what it’s worth, Allmusic.com likes the new stuff.)

Straight reissues, no new material: Mannheim Steamroller is celebrating 25 years since their first Christmas album. In case you don’t already own their staggeringly popular holiday series (but how is that possible?), there’s a two-CD best of that covers the bases. And there’s a remastered version of A Christmas Gift for You, produced by Phil Spector and featuring the Crystals, the Ronettes, Darlene Love, and Bobb B. Soxx and the Blue Jeans. It’s the first issue in a series: All of Spector’s work produced for his Philles label is set to be remastered and reissued in both physical and downloadable form with replica artwork. Interesting fact about A Christmas Gift for You: It was originally released on November 22, 1963. The album didn’t become a hit during that first holiday season, perhaps because it landed in a season filled with grief.

Much More Merriment: At WNEW.com, I’ve started writing the history of some famous rock and pop Christmas songs. Last weekend it was Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas”; today it’s John Lennon’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over).” (If you like ‘em, comment on ‘em.) At Popdose, Jason and Jeff are preparing to confront all things Christmas-musical with their annual Mellowmas series. The first installment is up today. Any Major Dude With Half a Heart goes old-school with the Christmas music;  AM, Then FM goes not quite so old.

“Angels We Have Heard on High”/REO Speedwagon (buy it here, cheap)

Before I forget, here’s the final installment of the series on one-hit-wonders whose lone claim to fame peaked at Number 97 on the Hot 100. (The first part is here and the second part is here.)

“Mississippi Mama”/Owen B (3/14/70, two weeks on chart). Here’s an artist more obscure than Wyatt (Earp) McPherson, the first one-hit wonder to peak at Number 97. Even YouTube DJ Music Mike doesn’t know much, except that Owen B was from Mansfield, Ohio. “Mississippi Mama” sounds like Three Dog Night on a caffeine high, and it clocks in at a Creedence-like 1:58.

“Check Yourself”/Italian Asphalt and Paving Company (5/9/70, two weeks on chart). A Jersey doo-wop group called the Duprees scored a Top-Ten hit in 1962 with “You Belong to Me.” They continued to record into the 1970s, and were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2008. But in 1969, they cut an album under the name of the Italian Asphalt and Paving Company. It yielded “Check Yourself,” which was more soul than doo-wop.

“Suite: Man and Woman”/Tony Cole (11/11/72, four weeks on chart). The word “suite” suggests the song is going to run on for a bit, and it did, lasting 4:45. The assistant PD of KMPC in Los Angeles told Billboard at the time, “Too bad the record companies are releasing singles too long to play, thus forcing stations to edit them or ignore them.” KMPC did just the former, cutting “Man and Woman” to 3:45. What I can piece together about Tony Cole is that he was an ex-schoolteacher who got a shot on American Bandstand in the early 60s and later sang on an Australian TV variety show that counted a pre-stardom Olivia Newton-John among its cast members. Which is not much, but at least he’s not Wyatt (Earp) McPherson.

“After Midnight”/Maggie Bell (5/18/74, three weeks on chart). Maggie Bell, sometimes described as the British Janis Joplin, sang in the Glasgow group Stone the Crows. (If they’re remembered at all nowadays, it’s primarily for the on-stage electrocution death of guitarist Les Harvey in 1972.) After that, Atlantic signed her to a solo deal, and she spent a year preparing the album that became Queen of the Night, released in ‘74 to great acclaim, and featuring “After Midnight.” The albums Suicide Sal and Great Rock Sensation followed, but she’s recorded only sporadically since 1977.

“All Roads (Lead Back to You)”/Donny Most (12/18/76, three weeks on chart). Today’s idea of marketing synergy requires stars to multi-task. It’s why Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers have TV shows in addition to singing careers, and why Beyoncé makes movies. But it’s not a new concept. Record companies often tried to parlay TV success into musical success, and never with greater gusto than in 1976. Theme songs from S.W.A.T. and Welcome Back Kotter were Number-One singles that year; themes from Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley made the charts as well, as did did singles by their stars. Most, who played Ralph Malph on Happy Days, got his shot with “All Roads.”

“My Pearl”/Automatic Man (2/19/77, two weeks on chart). Automatic Man was formed by Michael Shrieve and keyboard player Bayete (Todd Cochrane), who became the group’s principal songwriter. It also featured guitarist Pat Thrall, later to chainsaw his way to fame with Pat Travers. Shrieve was just out of Santana and the Go project, where he played alongside Steve Winwood and Stomu Yamashta. Winwood isn’t credited on Automatic Man’s debut album, although he was rumored to be on it. “My Pearl” is a little bit ELO and a little bit Jimi Hendrix, although the debut album’s cover is likely more familiar to record browsers than the music in it.

“Part Time Love”/Kerry Chater (4/2/77, two weeks on chart). Chater was a member of Gary Puckett and the Union Gap who became a full-time songwriter after the band broke up. One of his demos came to the attention of Steve Barri and Michael Omartian, who were extremely hot in the mid 70s, and they backed Chater with an A-list group of studio players for a solo album. All that couldn’t push Chater’s only hit beyond Number 97, giving him a place in history along Wyatt (Earp) McPherson.

One Other Thing: I mentioned on Facebook this morning that I was diggin’ a Rosanne Cash bootleg. I think you might dig it too, so go here, to the fabulous bigO Audio Archive.

“After Midnight”/Maggie Bell (buy it here)

As I’ve noted a million times before, the fall of 1970 is where time really begins for me—when the record charts first became the calendar of my life. I heard the season like the 10-year-old I was, gravitating toward my generation’s answer to the Jonas Brothers or Hannah Montana—the Partridge Family and Dawn. But while I was buying that stuff, I was also buying “Love the One You’re With” and “Domino,” and digging “Tears of a Clown” and “Share the Land” and “Immigrant Song.” And in the lifetime since, I’ve discovered the context in which those first beloved records appeared. And there’s context aplenty on the survey from WIXY in Cleveland, dated November 27, 1970:

3. “Back to the River”/The Damnation of Adam Blessing (up from 4). A Cleveland band from the same scene that produced the James Gang and the Raspberries, the Damnation of Adam Blessing made three albums between 1969 and 1971 before renaming itself Glory and eventually disbanding. The group’s bassist, Ray Benich, has an extensive website covering his and the group’s history, in which he mentions that he did nearly 18 years in prison (1982-2000) for a domestic shooting, “despite having no prior criminal record (except for that Glory album).” You gotta respect a man able to retain his sense of humor after all that. I’ve cooked up and discarded a whole string of metaphors describing what “Back to the River” sounds like (crappy example: “like ‘Run Through the Jungle’ done by Iron Butterfly, only without the organ”), so click the link, see if you can do better, and share in the comments

10. “No Matter What”/Badfinger (up from 15). Here’s a record that loses something in pristine stereo sound. It’s meant to be processed for AM radio and blasted, preferably from a few hundred miles away, into a little speaker you can hold in your hand. It was produced by Beatles’ road manager Mal Evans, and it should have made Phil Spector proud (although it more likely made him envious and bitter).

12. “Only Love Can Break Your Heart”/Neil Young (down from 8). According to Young’s biographer, the After the Gold Rush album, from which this comes, was Young’s attempt to merge the sounds of Crazy Horse with Crosby Stills Nash and Young. If so, “Only Love” comes pretty close. Here’s Young with Graham Nash and David Crosby performing it live in 1970:

Plus, it’s a waltz, which you hardly ever got on the Top 40.

13. “You Better Think Twice”/Poco (down from 10). The clip below is from a TV series called Something Else, hosted by comedian/impressionist John Byner that ran in the early 70s. It featured an impressive array of then-current stars, many of whom didn’t appear on television much, including the Flying Burrito Brothers, Canned Heat, the Ides of March, Richie Havens, Melanie, the Turtles, CCR, Taj Mahal, and others. I’ve been able to find precious little about this show online, but I intend to keep looking.

19. “Be My Baby”/Andy Kim (up from 27). This is one of the greatest made-for-AM-radio productions of all time—the echo, the ringing piano chords, and the skittering bass guitar, and that’s just the first 10 seconds. And whatever’s playing the instrumental break before the final refrain—string section? Theremin?—came sizzling out of your little speaker and straight into your brain. I can’t hear it without thinking about how WLS sounded at night—or about the 10-year-old me, listening on one little speaker, 135 miles away.

“No Matter What”/Badfinger (buy it here)