You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Holiday Classics That No Longer Sleigh

Episode Date: December 5, 2024

Do you ever find yourself lacking on a little holiday cheer? Do the holiday classics seem a little drab and dull lately? Well you may not be alone - Check out Peter and Adam's list of holiday classics that just aren't giving the same cheer they used to. Which holiday songs are you tired of hearing?  Link to our Spotify playlistLooking to drop a question? Want to listen to the audio pod? Look no furtherhttps://youllhearit.com/Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open Studio🎹 Head over to our YouTube channel for a better look 👀.Follow us on Instagram

Hey, Adam. Yo. Slays up. Indeed. Merry Christmas, everybody. I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hearer podcast.

Music explored and slayed. Slade brought you today by Open Studio. Go to Open Studio jazz.com for, oh, jazz lesson needs. It's Peter's spicy today. Well, this sleigh pun, we've already overdone it here in our preparation. Oh, you can't overdo the sleigh pun. time of year. Oh, you watch us. Oh, yes, we can. Can you overdo any

anything this time of year? It seems like it's just maximum, everything, including the songs that are on our playlist today. Well, that's kind of what this playlist is actually all about, is overdoing, at least some of them, have been overdone. They're beyond, what happens when you put a steak on the grill, it's overdone? Well done, overdone, and what's the next level?

Some people really love their stakes well done. I think after that it is nuked. Yeah, this is like nuke. Like, dehydrated. Dehydrated, yeah. I like it's... I like mine medium rare. I like it straight down the middle. A lot of pink. You know what I'm saying?

Right. That's the beautiful thing about vegan meats. You can do whatever. You can underdo them. You can overdo them and they're all safe, my friend. Well, Peter, today we're talking about holiday classics that no longer slay. A little backstory about this episode. We put together an episode of our favorite holiday classics.

And we were kind of like, this is boring. Because they're all very good, right? We just played a couple. Yeah. I mean, some of them I was like, I know we've played this before, like Glory Manager. We've definitely played that. Yeah. Harry Both on it.

But we decided to go negative instead. Why not? It's the holiday season. There is, it's already, so for us, we're recording this the week of Thanksgiving. You're probably listening to this a couple weeks later, but it's already started. Like it's already when you're out and about, you're hearing the holiday classics. And there are just some that we should retire. I feel like they've had a great run.

Some have only been around for a couple decades, but they should already go away. And there's some that have been around forever. Then I'm like, are we still? still doing this one? I know. You know what I mean? And it's also, we were thinking, like, to do the greatest holiday tracks, of course, you know, our albums. Ele Fitzgerald, you know, swing in. Oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, duh. That's a great, that's a great track.

The Harry Belafonte, Christmas one, classic. Obviously, the Nect Can Cole, Christmas One, classic. And actually, I'm also mentioned to a lesser-known Christmas album, 1989's Winton Marcellus, Crescent City Christmas Cart. Oh, he loves this one. That's kind of felt falling off the radar for some reason. That's a great record, but... We even had on there our favorite all-time, well, my... favorite all-time track. This Christmas, Donnie Hathaway, doesn't get any better. It's being a little

bit overdone with covers, but the original... Why cover that song? Why cover that song? It's so perfect. Yeah. And the original still slays. None of these sleigh, in my opinion. And some of these might be controversial, for sure. Oh, just to be, just to be transparent, actually, it was when we got to the point where you added this Christmas, Donnie Hathaway that I said, hold on a second. I was, because remember, I was like, News Flash, Danny Hathaway's this Christmas is great. Everybody knows that. It's obvious. It's obvious. But what, and some of these are going to be very obvious. I feel like our number 10, we're going to count them down from 10 to 1.

Yeah. I feel like our number 10 is obvious. This is one. I think this one's going to be our most controversial. I think folks can be like, no. No, I think people don't like this one. I love Eartha Kit, but I don't like this. Swinging, kind of.

Is it? Can you swing on a xylophone on the back beat? It's not even, it's anticipated back. Santa baby. Active mixing Just slip a sable under the tree For me Is this A-A-A-A-O-G

Original A-S-M-R? It's a little Santa baby So hurry down the chimney tonight Is it a songy? I mean That's some good arrangement Like Santa baby

But the craftsmanship on all of these That we're about here And the gentle is pretty hot But it's just like the sexy baby I'll wait up for you, dear. It's a little obvious, right? It's a little obvious. The tune itself is not that great, and it's just, it's like, why we've got to sexualize

Santa so much? Like, half Christmas songs are like, I want to make out with Santa. You know what I mean? We've got one of those coming up. I know, that's what I'm saying. It's like, it's Santa Claus. He's an immortal being that brings toys to children every year. And, like, all of a sudden, we're going to turn it into some kind of like...

Well, that was the Earth a Kid thing. For better or for worse, that during that period, period, she was kind of the OG sex kitten, you know, something that thankfully is not part of her society anymore. And that was originally released in 1953, so I know there was a lot of pent-up sexual energy back that they just had to, like, get out in weird ways, but it just feels a little like, okay. Well, and then this one, when does this usually pop up? This isn't one that you're going to hear at the mall as you're shopping.

Do you go to the mall, by the way? I do go to the mall. Nice. I like a mall. For sure. Yeah, I love a mall. You want to meet at the mall at the mall at the, at the mall at the, at the mall at the, Orange Julius late this afternoon. I'm not meeting you in a mall, dude. But I like going there with my,

you know, what's fun is to go to a mall with your teenage daughter. That's a good afternoon. You're going to get a good workout because you got to go to every store. Did I tell you last, about a year ago, in January, it'll be a year. Do you remember we had a crazy cold snap here? Yeah. Where it was like minus three or whatever. And I think I was still doing my run streak maybe at that time. And I was like, this is going to be a challenge to get out and run, even with my gear. I mean, it was so cold like you're, you know, Or as they say in Winnipeg, Canada, winter. Exactly. Normal day.

Normal day. But I went, I was like, you know what, I got to get out and move some. And I went mall walking. What? At the Galleria Mall in Richmond Heights, Missouri. Yeah, absolutely did. Did you run in the gallery? No, I didn't.

I was going to, but I could, but I was like, I got to at least go walk somewhere. It would have felt weird to run. I could have. That was available. It was weird. Mall walking, that was such a big thing back in the 90s. If you were to go to Crestwood Mall at 9 a.m., You're just going to be inundated with like old school new balances over some billowing khakis.

Maybe some white, all-white Reeboks. For sure. And just like, they're going to run you over. Shout out Andy in the studio. Where's white rebox? Shout out Andy. Okay, our next track, so that was 1953 Santa Baby. That could definitely go away for a couple of years at least.

Bye. Bye-bye. Next is an old Christmas carol written by William Charlton Dix in 1865. It's set to the tune Green Sleeves. It's actually not a bad tune at all. But this version is a bit of a dud in our opinion. We both agree on this of what is otherwise a classic, just complete, still slaying record. One of my favorites, actually.

It's from a Charlie Brown Christmas, and it's what child is this. Now, this is going to be a controversial pick, because I know there's probably some people's favorite version of what child is this, but this one always hangs wrong somehow in the air. And it's like at the beginning of the record, like the second, two, and third. Great playing from Bince. The whole record is great playing from Ben's girl. Something about this doesn't... It's not bad.

It's not great. This definitely is in the category, the tune, what shot, of the kind of morose, religious Christmas songs, you know? It's the... Yeah. It's the... It's the D-flat. B-flat.

It's a major. It's got that... After, like, two times of that theme... I'm out. I'm out. Again, the record itself is a classic. The record itself is immortal. That's what comes next.

The whole album. Yeah. But this particular track, I think. Got it. What child is this? Canceled. No, no, you know what I mean. Next up, this one can definitely go away for several years.

I mean, it's in some classic movies. So if you're going to watch Home Alone, you've got to deal with a little. Rocking around the Christmas Street. Grenzley, shout out. The guitar. Do you like your guitar? It's like Chuck Berry. Light, Light, Light, Like, Minus, Minus, Minus, minus, minus,

It's just all a little too cute seat. Really? Yeah. This was written by... Producer Caleb's feeling. Look at him. This is what I'm saying. This is definitely a little controversial one.

This was written by John David Marks, who, by the way, wrote several others that I could do away with. No offense, Johnny Marks. I'm sure you were a great composer. You wrote a lot of hits, including... I don't like the bridge. Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. A Holly John.

Charlie Christmas, which I really don't like either. Silver and gold. And I heard the bells on Christmas Day. That's okay. That one's just stopped. Make it stop. Make it stop. Stopped.

You know, what is it about some of these composers? For some reason, Christmas songs, they thought, like, did you hear that bridge there? It was like, it was like, like, they think they have to start doing all these changes. Like, it's like jazz changes time on the bridge. We don't need that. That was 1958's rocking around the Christmas tree. Next is, this is from one of our all-time favorite groups, The Jackson Five. This is just a weird song.

I don't mind this version. That's weird. This whole thing is a little weird. The raw nuts, 1963 is a little more. People can be mad that we put this on it. This is a lot of nostalgia. This is a lot of nostalgia. We don't care.

We can take a break. It's a nice little boot thing. Again, why we got to make that with Santa? Mommy Dad drunk while Mommy was making out with Santa? I think so. Yeah. And then it's kids singing about it.

This is another, it's too many changes. We don't need all this. And then this one right here. You're making it better. Like it's only two, five, one to the four. And that ain't only, yeah. The Jackson 5. I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus.

Michael's High Point at this or on thriller. We don't know. Definitely thriller. Man, I finally watched the Quincy, Jones documentary. I've never seen it. I don't know how I missed it, but it was freaking amazing. Cute. Yeah, just want to shout out Rashida Jones for making such an awesome film about her dad. Okay, next up, I think we're going to get a lot of agreement on this one, especially if you have to play CCM during this time, which I know we have a lot of listeners

that are having to play CCM gigs. You probably got to play this. A band called New Song. This is the most classic CCM intro ever. It's got the flurry on the symbol. From the year 2000. It's the Christmas shoes. Classic CCM boys. Man, the storytelling on this is so explicit. It's just specific. It's like, I was at the mall buying some shoes with me.

It's about as deep as a puddle. There's no metaphor, no simile, just description. Says the St. Louis connection, though. It was written by... No, Oström's wasn't open yet. It was written by new song group members, Eddie Carswell, and Leonard Allstrom. And St. Louis syndicated radio personality,

Isaiah D.C. Daniel of Stephen D.C. Remember Stephen D.C.? He probably don't, but, yeah. It's Christmas Eve, and these shoes are just her side. It's Christmas Eve, and these shoes are just hers. Really, you can't spice it up a little bit? Daddy says there's not much. Yeah.

Daddy said, no, no shade on the, on the Rads here of new song, but that can, that can take a couple of years off. Caleb, have you heard that song before? I'm not. You're not from around here, are you? Who me? I'm in the real world, Peter. This is what real people are listening to out there.

Leave in the comments. You listen to KZK for the 12.5 for your Christmas radio? You're going to get some Christmas shoes up in there. I mean, I've probably heard, it's probably played somewhere where I just have no awareness of the song. Please leave in the comments. I want to know if our listeners, if they live in the real world with you. They live in the real world.

They know. Or the world that Caleb and I inhabit. Now, I'm going to go. The real, real world. So we're going to go from that to kind of the opposite end. So for some reason, I turn into a little bit of a scrooge around Christmas time. I get very particular about my, like, Christmas songs. I want it to be home to slay.

I want it, but I want it to mean something and have a meaning. This is a religious time of year, right? This is like, it should be an introspective, spiritual awakening kind of of year. We're celebrating the birth of Christ here, buddy. Big ups. Right. You know what I mean? Slays up. Why we got to talk about war, John Lennon?

Why we've got to bring everybody down? You know what I mean? Yeah. So this is Christmas. Just the opening line. I love John Lennon, by the way. One of my all-time faces. He's an old-timer. He starts out the song with So This is Christmas. So far so good, right? Got the guitar

going? It's, listen. It's John Lennon, so you know it's going to be... political bent on it. Slaid, but like, it's a downer. So this is Christmas. Can we hear it? What did you mean? So accusatory.

Did you get some new shoes? Another year? I realize this is not going to be our most popular pick on this list, but it is. It's good. I hope you had fun. Oh, is this a soccer go dark? Do you know the song? No?

You don't know the song? No. Caleb, do you know this? Caleb doesn't know it. I think you're living in an alternative. Also, musically, it's not good. It's got some weird Lenin changes that he's not cool. It's not great.

String riding bass. Now, the hook there, war is over if you wanted. It's a nice message. Right. But it does feel a little bit like, I'm getting browbeaten by, like, by a, An English 100 millionaire? Like the woke media. In 1978.

I'd say that with many quotes. Right. You know what I mean? Yeah, totally. You know what I mean? I just like, come on, man, it's Christmas. And even the title, Happy X-Miss.

First of all, that's controversial. Yeah. Whenever I've put that in a message or whatever, people like, spell it out. I was like, isn't that with the X? This is like,

I'm not trying to exit. This is where Sean Hannity's like, you take it the Christ out of Christmas. And replaced it with an exit, putting a, a lib, John Lennon in there. Obviously John Lennon, a genius, but like, that's just not my favorite.

Yeah. It is, however, nowhere near as bad. Or is dark, honestly. Well, now we're getting to our top five. This should really, like, if we rank this correctly, we should be getting into some real dregs of society type of Christmas songs. Well, I think we're hitting it right here.

This is Gala Peeve. Of course. I want a hippo bottomers for Christmas. It's like a grown woman trying to sound like a little girl. Right. Which is weird too. No. Don't want a tinker toy.

I want a hippo bottomers to play with and enjoy. I want a hippo bottom. What's so innocent? Adam. I don't think Santa Claus will be like it. I don't think Santa Claus. You're Scrooge. I'm actually kind of turning on this one.

This might play a little bit. A dirty chimney flew. Just bring him through the front door. Is that a grown-assol? Yes, it's a grown-ass woman. Like how old? I don't know. It's got...

Caleb said helium like he was smoking a joint, like a helium joint. Like a helium joint. The problem, too, is the woodblock, zylophone, woodblock, clock and spiel, any of those instruments. Oh, okay. She was 10 years old. 40-year-old woman. It was 10 years old.

Okay. You're horrible. that off the list. Caleb, edit that part out. Like, Gayla Peavy's like 35 now.

Yeah, she's like, she's like my dad's age and she was 10 when she... Your dad's 35? Yeah, no. No, but I mean, you know what it is? Sorry, Gayla.

Nothing is Gayla. Obviously, you were being, you know, child labor, like, you know, pimped by your parents to be a Christmas singing star.

Hopefully you got a trust fun out of it. No, the problem is too, musically, because this is the music podcast, must I remind you of that. Yeah. Like, when you get the,

Here, we're going to play just the beginning. There's a certain, like, schlocky, sticky noveltyness to some of this stuff. Okay, the bassoon. The bassoon. Like, do, bo, bo, bo, bo, but, like, too, but, like, there are these little things as an arranger you have to occasionally throw in, right,

as little. But when the whole song is crafted around that, and if you do anything but that, you're going to be canceled, and your sleigh is going to be cast off. that's when it's a problem. So there's certain instruments, the bassoon a beautiful instrument,

but not when it's used like that. The woodblock. For some reason, the woodblock, take a corny rhythm, put it on the woodblock, and, you know, it's like a corn festival. It's like the Illinois Central Illinois Corn Fest, you know.

So, Peter, that brings us to our number three, which it's got to get worse now, right? Again, so this is a popular Christmas Carol, which is based on the Ukraine, New Year's song, Shedric, or Shedric, the music for the Carol comes from the song written by the Ukrainian composer Michael O'Leontovich in 1914. Wow. It's not bad.

You are a master of Wikipedia, my friend. But trans-Siberian orchestra is not doing any favors. This is called Christmas Eve slash Sarajevo 1224 from the ghosts of Christmas Eve. Well, Christmas Eve is 1224, so they got that part right. This is all over at least our local Christmas radio stations. We have Christmas radio stations? Casey, again, 102.5. Does it play in your testimony?

What are you doing when you're driving around? Now listen to Christmas songs. Series X-M? Okay. Streaming things? Oh, I know this. It's got kind of a, like trans-siber, like you're crossing the Siberia. but you're kind of like CCMing your way across Siberia, which is weird, right?

Porting other. It's a little medley. Yeah. That's Carol the Bells, right? No. That's... That's Carol. Yes.

All those instruments, this is all six? We don't know. Dexy Rock guitar. Oh, sorry. It's like the... It could be the soundtrack to die hard, right? It feels like, yeah. Oh, yeah.

When it gets that guitar, more to me. All right, can we move on to number two and number one? Because actually, I feel like number one, we're not quite there, but number one is going to like, I think one equals two through ten easily. Yeah, people can already sniff out what number one will probably be, just knowing our personalities. Right. This is a, this is number two, number two, this is a weird one. 1984.

I don't know this one. That's good. It's good? It's Christmas time. I'm still. Still laughing over Gaylep. I really thought that was a grown woman. Who's that?

So this is a charity song, Do They Know It's Christmas by Bob Geldof and Midge Er. Oh, this is the, you know, America people. Exactly. Yeah, it features just a ton of stars, artists. Oh, I don't like it. Make it stop. Oh, I do.

It features Bono, Robert, Cool Bell from Cool and the Gang. Pete Brugette from the Boontown Rats. Adam Clayton from you two. Phil Collins. Chris Cross. Simon Crow. Sarah Dalen from Banana Ramma.

We are a world of life. Boy George. Simon LeBahn. George Michael. How do you feel about the premises? Sting. Andy Taylor. John?

Taylor. It's Roger Taylor. They're trying to raise money to help. Are they trying to raise money or colonize? I don't know. It's the Inquisition? It feels very dated, the whole premise. And it doesn't sound good.

That's the biggest problem. It's just they tried hard and they didn't really pull it off. Close. Close, but no cigar. Okay, before we get to number one, can I throw in a like an honorable mention? Please do, yeah. I'm trying to even remember this will be fun to even try to remember I'm going to do a very weird

Spotify search. Grandma Christmas. Yep, there it is. There's a couple versions of this. Grandma got run over by a reindeer. I know, see, this is great. Walking home from our house Christmas Eve. Slays up.

Slays. You can say there's no such thing as Santa. This is weird, right? But as for me and Graham call, we believe. She'd been drinking too much egg naw. Of course. This is like later in the day, like the NFL games are on. Absolutely.

Absolutely. Yeah. Artist is Elmo and Patsy. This is called Middle America Christmas right here. This is the real, real people out here. You see that picture of Elmo and Patsy? Yeah, they really went on all in on Grandma got run over by reindeer. Do you see the picture of them on your thing?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They look like, like they're either from Three's Company. Or Branson? Branson. or like the USA Middle America Swinger Society. They do. I like that Christmas sweater she's got on, though. The only album they ever released was Grandma got run over by a reindeer.

Well, it took them all the way to Beverly Hills, my friend. You know there in Beverly Hills. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Elmo and Patsy, if you're out there, let us know where you are. That's a weird song, though, right? It's a weird song.

It's funny, though. I like that one. It's very descriptive, much as we had earlier. All right, we're up to number one. Are you excited? I'm excited. Now, you were saying before you think people are going to know what this is. I think this is going to be a little bit of a surprise.

I feel like an unpleasant surprise. Them knowing our personalities, they're going to be able to sniff this one out. Okay. But also, I just want to say, I've been on a journey with this song. Like, I used to kind of like it back in the day when it first came out. And it's been, I mean, it's been around since the early 90s, but it really gained popularity in the early 2000s. So it's had an interesting life. And now I feel like it's definitely on the back end and it needs to go away.

It is, of course. Mariah Carey. Queen of Christmas. I love Mariah Carey. Don't get me wrong. Love Mariah Carey. One of my favorite all-time pop artists. Starts out.

I need a break. Yeah. I need a break. Well, to me, it's like sneakily menacing. Like, now she's singing okay. Although the way these chor. There's some cool harmony kind of. Well, it's just very.

It's just, it gets. Like some nice half-step movement. It's okay, though, still. It's like what's going to happen? And then I do like the flat nine. I'm not a fan. I am a fan. It's written by Walter Afanassiev.

And that's nice. Who has done a lot of great stuff, including... Okay, this is what pisses me off this part. Yeah. It's kind of impressive. And then this... Can I... Can you bring up...

I don't like this group. I sent you a version that's my favorite version. Can you bring that up? Yeah. But I just want to talk about this one a little bit, but why. Because people be like, what? They know. They know that.

No, but that's. I'm just want to give you one example. Okay, check it out. It's just been overplayed, man. No, no, no. But I think it's badly presented. It's like a kind of groove. There's nothing wrong with the song.

It's whatever. But I'm saying when you get into this kind of groove, like the backbeat, the whole thing is set up to appeal to anybody in the world potentially. Yeah, yeah. Right. And they did their job. I guess. But like there's a backbeat on it, which should be a nice thing.

But it's a menacing. Backbeat. You know what I mean? No, I don't. It's like taking something nice. Check it out. Listen to it. It's an ugly backbeat. Like, why can't it just be, um? You make that face, yeah.

Do you like that? I don't love it. And then the baseline. It is a lot. It is bad. But it's done its job. It has gone around the world. That's what its job is.

But I'm saying, like, there's a few things that could have made it more palatable. It just gets really menacing, which is weird for Christmas. Like the beginning part is kind of. Zing. Yeah. Well, no, it doesn't, we don't have to jazz. You know, B'Bee-Bee-Bee-Bee-Bee-Bee-B-B-B-B-B-B-B-D-D-D-L.

All I want for Christmas. Oh, I'm clear. Like, oh, you're a clip. Really? Peter, bring up the one I sent you. There's a better version of this. Yeah, no, people definitely love that one more. There's a better version of this that came out a couple years ago by a band called Gregi Boy.

They got a short on Instagram. I got you. It's one of my favorite Christmas songs currently, actually. We got that cake. Okay, here we go. You know what I mean? Talk about menacing. There's no backbeat.

It's great. They don't even get to the backbeat. After a while, you just kind of zone into this Christmas spirit. You don't get otherwise. Yeah, they're actually playing it. Brecky Boys. Shout out Brecky Boy. It's genius.

That's good. That's very good. Oh, man. Shout out Mariah Carey. Big Em. Shout out Brecky Boy, Ed, Mariah Carey. Colab. Collab.

This was fun, man. This is... It took a little bit of work. Big shout out to all the artists on here, especially Gaila Peevy, young Gaila. Old-ass Gaila Peevies. Who's just now being a big 28-48.

Just now getting AARP age, you know. Oh, man. Talk about half-assed internet research. Well, no, you had a gut feeling on it. There's nothing wrong with that. Let's go out with the Brecky boys. Until next time. You'll hear.

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