SOUNDTRACK: MARY MARGARET O’HARA-Christmas E.P. (1991)
Mary Margaret O’Hara is a fascinating recluse. She released a cool, weird album in 1988 then did nothing for three years when she released this Christmas EP. Since then she hasn’t really released anything (except for a soundtrack).
O’Hara’s voice is her most notable feature (she warbles and swoons and is almost otherworldly–sometimes crazily so). She is the backing shrieker in Morrissey’s “November Spawned a Monster.” So one expects a pretty weird Christmas album from her.
But it’s actually fairly conventional and I have to admit a bit dull. “Blue Christmas” is just too slow for me. O Hara’s voice doesn’t have any oomph here. The cheesy violin solo doesn’t help either. “Silent Night” is, I feel, too pretty of a song for O’Hara’s voice which wobbles in weird ways for this track. “What Are You Doing New Years Eve?” suffers from the same as everything else on this disc–it’s too slow and languid. I know this song can be wistful, but I need this to be faster. “Christmas Evermore” fares the best on this disc because it isn’t familiar (to me). The music is a bit more uptempo (if still eccentric). And you don’t have other version to compare it to.
So, overall this proves to be a somewhat disappointing EP.
[READ: December 5, 2014] McSweeney’s 47
I love McSweeney’s issues that come in boxes with lots of little booklets. It somehow makes it more fun to read the stories when they are in little booklets with individual covers. In this instance, all of the booklets look basically the same–ten different cool pencil (and red) drawings on the cover done by Carson Murdach and a red back cover. The outer slipcase art is by Jason Polan.
There are ten booklets. One has a few letters and the rest are short stories. There’s even a surprise in here–the very exciting discovery of two lost Shirley Jackson stories. But there’s also the slightly disappointing realization that two of the books contain excerpts from McSweeney’s books (which I already own).
LETTERS: (more…)
I Just Read About That... 