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Christmas Songs & Singles. This index lists the essential songs (not all the songs) contained on the albums reviewed in my Christmas section, plus singles, album tracks, or one-hit wonders not otherwise included on those albums. Whenever
possible, the artist's name is linked to my review of the best Christmas album (not necessarily
the only or original album) on which to find the song.
Barring that, the names will be linked to a place where you may buy the song
(usually Amazon).
If there's no link, it means that, to my knowledge, the song is not available
on any CD. Of course, the list will expand as I write more reviews. And, nothing's
perfect - especially me and my crazy list. Please send additions, corrections,
criticisms, and suggestions via email.
- Keegan's Christmas (Marcy Playground, 1997)
- Kings Of Orient (The Odds, 1991)
- Kiss For Christmas (Jimmy Boyd, 1955)
- Kissin' By The Mistletoe (Aretha Franklin,
1963)
- Last Christmas
- Last Day Of December (Chilliwack, 1976)
- Last Minute Rush (Cheepskates, 1984)
- Last Month Of The Year (Chris Isaak,
2004)
- Last Train To Christmas (April
March y Los Cincos, 1998)
Indie
princess and pop changeling April March is best known for her fiesty side -
as a punk rocker with the Shitbirds (with whom she cut a fabulous version of
"Christmas Is A-Coming" for Happy
Birthday Baby Jesus) and as a sexy,
faux French chanteusse (cf. Chick
Habit). "Last Train To Christmas," however, is cut from an entirely
different cloth. Extracted from a one-off collaboration, April
March y Los Cincos, the song is a moody, impressionistic piece of chamber
pop somewhat out-of-step with the bossa nova flavor of the rest of the album.
Charming, nonetheless. Lastly, I am compelled to point out that a 45-rpm
record commonly attributed to April March ("Christmas In Killarney"
b/w "When Christmas Rolls Around" on Keystone Records) is not this April
March, but rather an obscure supper-club pop singer, circa 1960.
- Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!
- Let Me Hang My Stockings In Your Christmas Tree (Roosevelt
Sykes, 1937)
- Let Me Sleep (Christmas Time) (Pearl
Jam, 1991)
- Let Us Love (Bill
Withers, 1972)
- Let's Make Christmas Mean Something This Year (James
Brown, 1966)
- Let's Make Christmas Merry Baby
- Let's Put Christ Back In Christmas (Tammy
Wynette, 1970)
- Let's Spend Christmas At My House (Tom T. Hall, 1988)
- Let's Start The New Year Right (Bing Crosby,
1942)
- Let's Unite The Whole World At Christmas (James
Brown, 1968)
- Light My Way (Bangles, 2006)
- Light Of The Stable (Emmylou Harris,
1975)
- Like A Snowflake (Ride, 1991)
- Listen The Snow Is Falling (Yoko
Ono & The Plastic Ono Band, 1971)
Yoko's
bucolic b-side to "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" has been largely forgotten
by history - it even gets ignored by bootleggers (c.f. the Beatles' The
Ultimate Christmas Collection). Yet, it's a lovely meditation on winter
that perfectly compliments John Lennon's more celebrated a-side. "Listen" has
never been included on a Christmas album, but it has been issued as bonus track
on CD a couple of times - first on John & Yoko's
otherwise unlistenable Wedding
Album (1969), then on the duo's more palatable Sometime
In New York City (1972) along
with "Happy Christmas." Also recommended - Galaxie 500's 1990 cover
version from This
Is Our Music, further available on the band's excellent retrospective, The
Portable Galaxie 500 (1998).
- Little Becky's Christmas Wish (Becky Lamb,
1967)
- Little Boy That Santa Claus Forgot (Nat King
Cole, 1953)
- Little Bright Star (Supremes, 1965)
- Little Cajun Drummer Boy (Evan Johns & The
H-Bombs, 1990)
- Little Christmas Tree (Nat King Cole, 1950)
- Little Christmas Tree (Michael Jackson,
1973)
- Little Drum Machine Boy (Beck,
1996)
- Little Drummer Boy
- Little Drummer Boy (Up The Khyber) (Hoodoo
Gurus, 1991)
Australia's
leading power popsters transformed Harry Simeone's hoary classic into a smokin'
surf-instrumental-cum-Indian-raga as the b-side of their 1991 single "Castles
In The Air." The Guru's "Drummer Boy" was also featured on A
Lump Of Coal, a solid alt-rock holiday
album released later the same year, and was later compiled on Gorilla
Biscuit,
a collection of odds and sods that served as a companion to Electric
Soup (1992), a greatest hits collection. Much later, "Drummer Boy" was
added as a bonus track to the deluxe 2005 CD reissue of Kinky -
the album from which "Castles In The Air" was excerpted. Completist maniacs
should note that "Jungle Bells," the third track from the "Castles" CD
single, is neither the song recorded by Les Paul & Mary Ford (1953) and the
Four
Seasons (1962) nor - despite appearances - a Christmas song at all. Rather, it's
an original Hoodoo Guru composition (also
compiled on Gorilla Biscuit) that dates
back to 1988 when it was originally released as the flip of "The
Generation Gap" (a non-LP single compiled on Electric
Soup). Got that?
- Little Jack Frost, Get Lost (Bing Crosby & Peggy
Lee, 1952)
- Little White Mouse Called Steve (Jimmy Charles, 1961)
- Little Red Rooster (Tom Petty & The
Heartbreakers, 2000)
- Little Saint Nick (Beach Boys, 1963)
- Littlest Angel (McGuire Sisters, 1955)
- Lo, How A Rose E'er Blooming (John Fahey,
1982)
- Lonely Christmas (Sloppy
Seconds, 1992)
- Lonely Christmas (aka Lonely Christmas Again) (Bob
Wagner, 1962)
- Lonely Christmas Call
- Lonely Christmas Eve (Ben
Folds Five, 2000)
Ben
Folds has written a couple of Christmas songs, but "Lonely Christmas Eve" is
the more musically agreeable of the two. Thus far, however, it has only been
commercially released on the soundtrack of Jim Carrey's live-action adaptation
of Dr. Seuss' How
The Grinch Stole Christmas (2000). Written for the film, the song adopts
the perspective of the Grinch, gazing down disdainfully at the Christmas Eve
celebrants from atop his lonely mountain. "How I hate their happy noise!" Folds
exclaims, adding "There's only one thing I hate more... the people who keep
making it." In 2002, Sony appended the song as the flipside of a promo-only,
7-inch vinyl single promoting "Bizarre Christmas Incident," a song
from the inaugural edition of Nettwerk Record's Maybe
This Christmas series.
- Lonely Christmas Eve (Ernest
Tubb, 1954)
- Lonely Without You (This Christmas) (Mick
Jagger & Joss Stone, 2004)
- Lonesome Christmas (aka I Wanna Spend Christmas With You) (Lowell
Fulson, 1950)
- Look Around You (It's Christmas Time) (Bobby
Goldsboro, 1968)
- (Look At The) Reindeer Rock (Jimmy Boyd,
1955)
- Look Out The Window (Gene Autry & Rosemary
Clooney, 1952)
- Looking For Santa (Hungry Dutchmen,
1988)
- Looks Like A Cold, Cold Winter (Bing Crosby,
1950)
- Love For Christmas (Ebonaires, aka Jackson
Trio, 1955)
- Love For Christmas (Gems, 1964)
- Love For Christmas (Felix Gross,
1949)
- Love For Christmas (Carole King, 2002)
- Love Turns Winter Into Spring
- Love's What You're Getting For Christmas (Bobby
Sherman, 1970)
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