Christmas Mix 2013
(mouseover cover image)
full track listing

Just like last year's mix, there are songs I bought and free songs. Once again, I'm not gonna mention every song on the CD, even though I like them all. Also once again, we start with a cover of "Welcome Christmas," always a good way to start a holiday CD. This time it's by The Clumsy Lovers, though I don't recall if this was a free mp3 or if I discovered it while specifically searching for covers of the song.

...Then another version of one of my favorite songs, "Carol of the Bells," this time by the always amazing Pentatonix. I'm sure when I made my 2012 mix CD, it was hard choosing whether to go with this one or BarlowGirl's version, but now... I've got both. (Come to think of it, the same was true of "Welcome Christmas.")

...Then "Wonderful Christmastime" by Paul McCartney. This is about as 80s as it gets. Some people find it unbearable, but I like it well enough (in moderation). Anyway, when I made this CD, I specifically wanted to include music from different eras, whereas the previous CD was almost all fairly recent recordings.

..."Father Christmas" by the Kinks.. All I can say is it's one of my all-time favorite Christmas songs.

..."Let it Snow" by Luscious Jackson. I remember them doing a shorter version of this in a Gap ad, in the 90s I think. So of course I was keen to hear the full length version.

..."All I Want For Christmas Is You" by Mariah Carey. This is a lot of people's favorite Christmas song. It's not really one of my favorites, but I do like it a lot. It makes me nostalgic for the 90s, I guess (but then again, what doesn't?) Also I've noticed (in 2015) that a lot online personality quizzes that ask your favorite Christmas song include this as an option, and usually when they do it's my favorite one of the choices.

..."Good King Wenceslas" by The Irish Rovers. A song I've always been only vaguely aware of, and when I made this CD I guess I was randomly feeling interested in getting to know the song better, so I spent some time trying to find whose version I would like best, before settling on this one.

..."Winter Wonderland" by Sleeper Agent. One of the most familiar Christmas songs, and always nice, but this take is a nice change of pace. I already knew a couple of songs by the band before I heard this, so it didn't surprise me that their version totally rocks.

..."The Christmas Song" by Nat 'King' Cole. This was on what must have been the first Christmas album I ever bought (on cassette), which I think was in the late 80s. So it was nostalgic to me, and a kind of obvious choice for one of the older era songs to include here.

..."Mele Kalikimaka" by Jimmy Buffet. Another of the older songs on the mix, and also one of the few that aren't entirely in English (though it's just the title that isn't; other songs on this CD, "Feliz Navidad" and "O Tannenbaum" have more non-English). I'm thinking the year I made this CD might be when some of my relatives went to Hawaii for Christmas, which may have influenced me to choose this song. To kind of make up for their absence in Maine that year.

..."Silver Bells" by Doris Day. Another song I've always really loved, and that I wasn't sure whose version I'd like best. So I listened to several artists' versions before settling on this one. The way Day's voice trills is just perfect for this song.

..."Little Drummer Boy" by Pentatonix. When this came out, everyone thought it was pretty incredible because it was like the first time in history that anyone's ever done a version of the song that people actually liked. Way to accomplish the impossible, Pentatonix!

...The CD closes with "Season's Freaklings" by Bunnygrunt. This was originally released in the 90s, but I first heard it when it played at the end of the 2003 movie Bad Santa (which I first saw several years after it came out). Anyway, the song is pretty cool, but pretty much impossible to get a legit recording of, these days, even as an mp3. So... yeah, this ain't legit. But my feeling is, if it's obvious whoever has the rights to a song doesn't want your money, they have no right to complain if you obtain it however you can. (I totally would have paid for it, if that were even an option.)