What do Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, Tom Petty, U2, and the Smashing Pumpkins all have in common? They all have released songs on various artists Christmas albums such as “Now That’s What I Call Christmas!” or the wonderful “A Very Special Christmas” series. A lot of these songs might have also been released in standalone single editions (for anyone that wants to remember the days where you could buy the new McCartney 7” for less than $2), but no one in their right mind ever released a FULL ALBUM of Christmas songs. I mean, could you imagine U2 attempting to squash through “Up on the Housetop” in their late 80s/uber-Americana phase? No! What if the Smashing Pumpkins put together a “rockin’ medley of “Jingle Bells” and “Silent Night”, all the while simultaneously ripping off Led Zeppelin and the Jesus and Mary Chain? That just wouldn’t work. At least, not for a full album.
Bob Dylan has released an entire album of Christmas classics and a few originals the week before Halloween.
I can’t exactly figure out what was going through Mr. Zimmerman’s head while doing production on this album, but whatever it was, Dylan needs to stop doing it. Throughout the whole recording, he sounds like Tom Waits with a garbage disposal for vocal chords. While you might find this interesting, I can guarantee you that it isn’t. Honestly, it’s really hard to hear Dylan singing like this. While is currently shot voice sounded fine even on the last album (“Together Through Life”), here, it’s painful to listen to. Listening to Dylan trying to rip through these standards, one could think that these winter pastime sing-a-longs would have extremely hard melodies and that he suffered a vocal blowout before each track.
The album also suffers from major problems within the band as well. For the first time since “Knocked Out Loaded” (folks might know this as the one with the infamous “Maybe Someday”, featuring gospel singers, out of time drums, and a bassist who liked playing random offbeat accents during random intervals), Dylan sounds horribly out of sync with his band on most of these tracks. Another tip of the hat towards the awful “Knocked Out Loaded” comes in the form of “Christmas Island”, a Christmas song with a Hawaiian flair that just doesn’t sound very good.
But I think the biggest problem comes with the fact that all of these arrangements sound pretty much like any other Christmas album featuring Cookie Monster on lead vocals. I mean, I would assume Dylan is a clever guy, I mean he put out that album “Shot of Love”! He has to have a sense of humor! Instead, all we get is a bunch of generic sounding backing tracks with Dylan attempting to sing Christmas carols over them.
Maybe this would be nicer to take in various sittings, much like how radio stations play Christmas music by different artists come the day after Thanksgiving. But it fails as an album, making things like the Chipmunks Christmas album, Jingle Cats, any Bing Crosby compilation, and the two songs off the “Peel Sessions Box Set” by The Fall appear to be holiday masterpieces.
OVERALL RATING – Certainly wouldn’t bring this to my next holiday party, but I might certainly enjoy hearing one song every couple of weeks.
KEY TRACKS – “Must Be Santa”, “Do You Hear What I Hear?”, “I’ll Be Home For Christmas”
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