Ok, by now you’ll all be throwing things when you hear the jingling bells of Christmas music ?
I don’t blame you. A lot of Xmas music starts well but gets corrupted by the latest person to try making a fast buck out of old classics.
However … I do have some Xmas music in the library … And those albums are awesome in their own ways. Hmm. This wasn’t supposed to be an Xmas music post but I can’t resist doing the old Youtube linky thing to :
Hey Santa ! By Hannah Peel. Sadly Youtube don’t seem to have this one but it’s on Last.fm and Spotify.
Abba’s Happy New Year. I heard someone in HMV tonight trying to sing along to this one. Hopefully I’m doing a better job at the moment 😉
Think I’ve run out of the choice Xmas music there though. I have Xmas albums from Joan Baez and Elaine Paige which are both excellent to listen to. The Joan Baez album is very pure choral style, the Elaine Paige is more show style.
What else have I been listening to lately that has stuck in my head all day ?
Well – today it was the turn of Tracy Chapman’s Material World. She’s a great singer in her own way. She’s different from the crowd, so she’s not really mainstream like all the female singers who clone others. But – different is good. I only have her first album and Crossroads … may have to pick up some more. Great voice, used very well.
At the moment, it’s the Songs For Polarbears album by Snow Patrol. It’s from their earlier days when they were still Indie/Alternative with interesting rough edges in their music. They’ve gone a mainstream (and boring) now though. My pick of this album is Fifteen Minutes Old. Not their best album, bit of quantity over quality.
Next album up (after a bunch of semi-random tracks) is the soundtrack to Indie Game The Movie. I’ve been picking up a lot of soundtracks lately. Some of them, like the FTL soundtrack, work really well as music to listen to. Others, like the Retro City Rampage soundtrack, are good as individual tracks but have you reaching for the Skip Track button when you have them coming through as an album. Hopefully Indie Game the Movie will work well as a soundtrack.
I listen to a bit of classical music too, last album/collection to go through was the Planets Suite by Holst. This one has been borrowed from hugely to donate music to pieces like the Rugby World Cup (World In Union is Jupiter with words I believe). There’s also the unmistakeable Mars. Curious how the dead planet Mars got tagged as War, whereas the absolute hell which is Venus got tagged as Peace.
Talking of classical – what makes Christmas if not the annual Star Wars movie ? The soundtrack to Return of the Jedi got listened to earlier this week. Classic tunes.
But it tends to stay in the background. Unlike the enchanting Norah Jones, who’s Feels Like Home got listened to at the weekend. Here’s In The Morning, it’s a track where I’m not sure I want to sing along to or if I should just listen to that voice. She’s one of very few artists who I’ll pay full price for getting albums more quickly (still not got the latest Garbage)
And there’s more too. I loved River City People when I was at school but something turned me away from Texas (perhaps I thought that voice was being enhanced …). Which is a shame, as I found out when I picked up their greatest hits album. I’m hoping for snow but I’ve been so cold lately that I’d welcome a bit of Summer Sun.
I think it’s time to close up now. And after hearing Rythian and Zoey do a rendition of Baby It’s Cold Outside, I feel the need to listen to the Tom Jones & Cerys Matthews version to banish it from memory …
I hope you don’t get inflicted with too much horrific music over the next month !