SOUNDTRACK: VERVE-Remixed Christmas (2008).
One of my favorite Christmas CDs is the Christmas Remixed discS (1 and 2) which adds some fun beats and loops to some old standards. Generally speaking I don’t love remixes. They are usually just longer with louder, danceable drums. Although remixing old songs does tend to modernize them, which I do like.
I was pretty excited to see that Verve records has made one as well, using their back catalog. I assumed it would be just as wild and fun. But it turns out either Verve has very few Christmas songs in its back catalog or the remixers are kind of low on ideas.
I’m also fairly surprised at just how few actual Christmas songs are here.
1. Count Basie “Good Morning Blues” (Real Tuesday Weld Clerkenwell Remix)
This is probably my favorite track on the disc. It’s got a fun looping piano melody which is added to by a trumpet and some strange sound effects. This is in fact a Christmas song, I wonder why it’s not sung more.
2. Louis Armstrong-“Zat You, Santa Claus?” (The Heavy Remix).
There’s heavy winds blowing which may be in the original. Overall it feels like there’s not that much remixing going on. Still a fun song.
3. Ella Fitzgerald-“What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve” (Magini Vs. Pallin Mix).
It starts distant and muffled then bursts through via harps. The music is definitely different, but not crazy or anything. I’m assuming the only remixed element is the bigger drums that come in. It’s a fine version, but nothing especially fun.
4. Billie Holiday-“I’ve Got My Love To Keep Me Warm” (Yesking Remix).
There’s a Jamaican element to this song, including a guy with a heavy accent shouting. That whole reggae element is an interesting twist.
5. Louis Armstrong-“What A Wonderful World” (The Orb Remix) ℵ
The intro is looped. After several loops complete with shushing sounds, an electronic bass comes in with loud drums in a regular loop. But the vocals are pretty much the same. This is of course not a Christmas song by any stretch of the definition.
6. Shirley Horn “Winter Wonderland” (Christian Prommer Remix)
This is made bouncy with a slightly funky bass line and kind of sultry drums. Slowed down with a funky slightly bass line. Vocals are slow and trippy. The vocals sort of don;t work either–they feel like more of an afterthought.
7. Jimmy Smith “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” (Oh No Remix)
This is the most radical song on the disc. The bass is crazy, the tone is crazy. The whole thing has a kind of sinister feel. I love the whole thing. There’s some keyboard soloing, some menacing horns riffs and no vocals. It’s wonderful how much this doesn’t sound like the song and yet you can tell that what it originally was.
8. Nina Simone “I Am Blessed” (Wax Tailor Remix) ℵ
This opens with vinyl crackling. A funky drum is added, but otherwise I don’t think much has been modified. It’s a pretty song and the drums add to it, but it is not a Christmas song.
9. Dinah Washington “Silent Night” (Brazilian Girls Remix)
This is a full on dance song with a kind of conga rhythm. Dinah is mostly just repeating “silent night, holy night” with no other vocals. Normally I don’t like messing with this song, because it is so beautiful. But Brazilian Girls has deconstructed the song so much that I now rather like it,
10 Mel Tormé “The Christmas Song” (Sonny J Remix)
The Velvet Fog is accompanied by some electronic and techno beats. His voice is reduced to a loop of “know how to fly” for much of the song although his other verses do come through from time to time. They manipulate his voice in interesting ways too. I rather like this one.
11. Nina Simone “Chilly Winds” (Fink Remix) ℵ
Quiet looping of piano and repeats of “chilly winds don’t blow.” This is also not a Christmas song and seems the largest stretch, except that the winds are cold.
So there are certainly some fun songs here, but overall, it’s far less successful than the other remixes.
ℵ = Not a Christmas song.
[READ: December 11, 2018] “Mister Elephant”
Once again, I have ordered The Short Story Advent Calendar. This is my third time reading the Calendar (thanks S.). I never knew about the first one until it was long out of print (sigh). Here’s what they say this year
Fourth time’s the charm.
After a restful spring, rowdy summer, and pretty reasonable fall, we are officially back at it again with another deluxe box set of 24 individually bound short stories to get you into the yuletide spirit.
The fourth annual Short Story Advent Calendar might be our most ambitious yet, with a range of stories hailing from eight different countries and three different originating languages (don’t worry, we got the English versions). This year’s edition features a special diecut lid and textured case. We also set a new personal best for material that has never before appeared in print.
Want a copy? Order one here.
Like last year I’m pairing each story with a holiday disc from our personal collection.
I enjoyed this story for a number of reasons. Primarily, I think because the narrator is so inadvertently unreliable (which in the interview, Jessica doesn’t really mention).
It begins with this line: “My former friend is an elephant trainer.”
He hadn’t seen her in a long time, but they went to the zoo and there she was. He was totally intimidated by her because she looked so professional in her khaki uniform. Meanwhile, he was wiping his kid’s nose with the back of his hand because he forgot tissues.
His daughter desperately wants to go on an elephant ride, but there’s no way he’s allowing that to happen. She won’t leave aside the idea of the stupid elephants. He even tries to distract her with the lemurs and their big inquisitive eyes. She wasn’t interested. “She never cared about the small adorable things that little girls are supposed to like. Which I’ve always thought was strange.”
He addresses this concern to his wife, but his wife is all about breaking gender stereotypes, plus “she’s been reading a lot of articles on the internet lately.”
He and his daughter eat a funnel cake and he remembers back to his former friend. He remembers “all the times I was nice to my former friend and all the times she pretended to be nice back to me. As I if I didn’t know she was faking it.”
Back in high school, this friend was often the butt of much abuse–people would spray their juice boxes at her for example.
He thinks back to grammar school. In class they were told to close their eyes and make tiny pencil marks all over the paper. Then open their eyes and an image would appear. Everyone drew amazing things except him. he couldn’t see any images at all. Then next day he saw a girl in the park. He tried to talk to her but she ignored him, “she was obviously not a polite or considerate person.” He drank a soda in front of her but she didn’t say a word. So he bonked her on the head with the empty can. Not hard.
But still, it did something to her. Made her sort of slump down, then sort of roll off the bench and ended up in the dirt. I nudged her with my shoe, but her eyes were closed. I had this crazy though that maybe she was a robot. … Then her bottle fell off the bench and landed next to her face … her ice tea spilled out and made a puddle around her. I felt bad about that. She;d wake up and she’d be all sticky. I walked away.
WHAT?
I was sure the girl was dead, but in an unexpected twist, this is the girl who is his former fried, the elephant tamer. She ended up in his grade nine biology class telling him that her dream was to work with animals. She didn’t recognize him and they became friends.
These thoughts lead to a happy ending for the girl, but wow, this guy (an his daughter) is in serious mental trouble.
But here’s the interview with Jessica Westhead.
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