J's Indie/Rock Mayhem - 22nd December 2010Christmas Holiday Spectacular!

[Welcome to the J's Indie/Rock Mayhem Christmas Holiday Spectacular! Just in time to celebrate the holidays with family, it's two hours of Christmas and holiday season related music that will make you laugh, make you cry, make you run for the liquor. My thanks to all the people I've talked with in the last week who submitted ideas for this to flesh out my traditional songs. If you're a long-time listener to the show, you'll recognize a good chunk of these as annual participants, but there's a good bit of new performers as well, so settle in, bring the family around the computer speakers and/or mp3 player, snuggle up and listen. I'll be back next week with a totally normal version of J's Indie/Rock Mayhem.

Now, onward.]

J's Indie/Rock Podcast: 22nd December 2010 show

Them Song - Peaches - "Rock Show"
>
Run-DMC - "Christmas in Hollis" [from a very special christmas, a 1989 compilation to raise money for the special olympics. this song is stupidly fun. always has been. always will be.]
Elastica - "I Wanna Be a King of Orient Aah" [from bbc sessions. a cheeky little bend on the classic christmas tune.]
Roadside Graves - "Holiday Road" [from the aquarium drunkard session from earlier this year. a cover of the lindsey buckingham classic.]
Black on White Affair - "Auld Lang Syne" [from in the christmas groove from 2009, a great funk and soul compilation. funky.]
>
Darlene Love - "White Christmas" [from a christmas gift for you from phil spector. one of the two artists in this set who are going to be inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame in 2011.]
Tom Waits - "Christmas Card From a Hooker in Minneapolis" [from blue valentines. and here's the other one. very excited that the tom is getting his due.]
the Housemartins - "I Smell Winter" [from now that's what i call quite good. a favorite seasonal song of mine.]
Slade - "Merry Xmas Everybody" [from slade smashes. a huge band in england and a huge song there as well; i first heard it in a commercial when i was studying there in college. pretty fantastic.]
>
the Ramones - "Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)" [from brain drain. one of only three decent songs on an otherwise pretty turgid record, this is still a certifiable christmas classic in my book. i think that this is the commercial i refer to in the podcast. not quite what i remember, but that's it.]
James Brown - "Soulful Christmas" [from funky christmas. there's a wealth of james brown christmas stuff out there, so here's one of 'em.]
Big Star - "Jesus Chris" (demo) [from keep an eye on the sky. i've played this every year for the past few years as a christmas thing, but it took on special meaning this year with all the big star related sadness that happened.]
the Beatles - "Christmas Single 1967" [another rip from aquarium drunkard, this time of the beatles' christmas singles club recordings. if you head over there, you can grab all of them from '63 - '69. this particular one had the most entertainment for radio value, i believe.]
>
John Denver - "Please, Daddy (Don't Get Drunk This Christmas)" [from denver's 1975 rocky mountain christmas. i love this song, i don't care what bryan says.]
the Pogues - "Fairytale of New York" [from if i should fall from grace with god. several people on twitter commented that this was their favorite christmas song of all time and i really can't disagree with them. it's just note perfect.]
Patton Oswalt - "My Christmas Memory" [from feelin' kinda patton. this would be my favorite christmas stand-up bit of all time.]
Jim White - "Christmas Day" [from no such place. perhaps this song stretches the boundaries of 'christmas' just a bit, despite its title, but it fits the loneliness theme of this set.]
Joni Mitchell - "River" [from blue. i love songs that use small interpolations of classic songs within their structure. (see my occasional rants about preferring the demo version of dwight yoakam's "i sang dixie" to the eventual album version.) and "river" is one of those songs that just makes my heart ache every time because of it.]
>
David Bowie and Bing Crosby - "Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth" [from the final bing crosby christmas special recorded before he died. the original video is, of course, a classic, and i have to play the dialogue along with the song itself. but this reinterpretation by will ferrell and john c. reilly is creepy in its accuracy and small changes. i dig it.]
Vince Guaraldi - "My Little Drum" [from a charlie brown christmas. this is, of course, a classic of the christmas music genre and i decided to put together a whole set of versions of "little drummer boy." every one in this set is decently different from one another, i believe.]
Low - "Little Drummer Boy" [from merry christmas. i heard this on a gap commercial years ago and was pretty blown away by it. i'm still really fond of low's christmas record in general.]
Beck - "The Little Drum Machine Boy" [from just say noel. hat-tip to jay ewing for mentioning this to me the other night. i always laugh when i have to edit holiday songs for lyrical content and this was no exception.]
the Flaming Lips - "Little Drummer Boy" (live) [from providing needles for your balloons. a good chunk of this EP is a live show from the transmissions from the satellite heart era of the band and it's an interesting take on some original and cover songs.]
>
the Kinks - "Father Christmas" [from come dancing with the kinks. there's hardly a rockier christmas song out there. i love it.]
the Didjits - "Under the Christmas Fish" [from hey judester. sacrilege seems important this time of year, so yeah, the didjits.]
the Pretenders - "2,000 Miles" [by request. from learning to crawl. sweet without being sappy. perfect.]
Type O Negative - "Red Water (Christmas Mourning)" [from october rust. the death of peter steele earlier this year was pretty sad, even if i hadn't spent a lot of time listening to type o negative in recent years. this song is still a staple of my christmas shows and, really, shows the band at its overly-dramatic best.]
Vince Guaraldi - "Christmastime is Here" [and why not some more guaraldi? from the same a charlie brown christmas, it's one of those songs i truly couldn't get away with not playing.]

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas to you all. I'll be back next week with the regular edition of J's Indie/Rock Mayhem. Until then, be safe, have a wonderful holiday, Go Panthers!, and take care.