I love when episodes overlap. Today, soul singer Eli "Paperboy" Reed talks about--among other things--his love of Huey "Piano" Smith's Christmas album, which we recently featured.  Reed has a new album, Hits and Misses: The Singles on YepRoc Records, and today we're talking about that and his Christmas music, including a snappy version of "Last Christmas" by Wham! Along the way, we talk about a couple of tracks that weren't available on mp3, "What Do the Lonely Do at Christmas" by The...

Chuck Brown has been dubbed "The Godfather of Go-Go," the distinctive Washington D.C.-based funk sound that has its own aesthetics and culture. This week, New Orleans' musicologist and go-go aficionado Melissa Weber shines some light on go-go and Brown because in 1999, he released The Spirit of Christmas. Weber is an archivist at Tulane University, and in New Orleans she DJs at WWOZ and throws parties under the name she's best known by, DJ Soul Sister. We talk about Brown, his Christmas...

New Orleans venerates its R&B royalty from the early days of rock 'n' roll, and many of them stayed active until they died, including Dr. John, Allen Toussaint, Eddie Bo, Snooks Eaglin and Earl King. Huey "Piano" Smith was not one of them; he lived the last third of his life until his death earlier this year out of the limelight. Since Smith also recorded one of my favorite Christmas albums, 1962's Twas the Night Before Christmas, I invited journalist John Wirt on the show to talk about...

Capitol Records tried to cash in on the '90s lounge revival with its "Ultra-Lounge" series--albums that pulled tracks from the label's vaults that fell under some of the umbrellas that came to associated with lounge including crooners, mambos, space-age sounds, and tiki bar music. In 1996, it released Christmas Cocktails, with series compiler Brad Benedict pulling together holidays songs from those genres. It was so successful that Capitol released Christmas Cocktails Vol. 2 in 1997, then...

The name "Sara Noelle" sounds like something made up for Christmas music, but she had been a recording artist since 2010, 10 years before she released her first Christmas track, "Christmas at Sea." Since 2020, the ambient folk artist has made a tradition of releasing new Christmas music each year, and it's not a reach to think her songs would make sense on David Lynch's Twin Peaks Holiday Special. Noelle's songs aren't haunted, but the electronic atmospherics paired with her treated voice...

In 2018 when I launched Twelve Songs, I published "The 12 Songs Manifesto," a statement of my core beliefs about Christmas music.  Now that we're in our sixth season and have a lot of listeners who weren't around back then, I thought it was worth revisiting and documenting in podcast form. I flesh out my thoughts, add a few and revise a few that no longer seem as crucial to me. And, I have music by Luther Vandross, Rockin' Sidney, Paul McCartney, Alexander O'Neal, The Bird and the Bee,...

Chris Marchand's blog post "On the Importance of Sad Christmas Songs" makes the argument its title promises, using "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" as Exhibit A. Podcaster and writer Chris Marchand last appeared on Twelve Songs to break down Sufjan Stevens' Christmas albums, and this week he returns to talk about "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."  The song written for Judy Garland to sing in the movie Meet Me in St. Louis was too bleak in her mind for the situation, so it was...

Last week, I started the story of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," taking the song from being written by Haven Gillespie and J. Fred Coots, to the first version by banjo player/bandleader Harry Reser, to the version that popularized the song by Eddie Cantor.  This week, the song grows up with the help of Phil Spector, The Crystals, and Bruce Springsteen.

"Santa Claus is Coming to Town" is an orphan, a Christmas song without a singer attached. "White Christmas" has Bing Crosby, "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" has Andy Williams, and "Happy Holidays" has Peggy Lee. But who sang the early version of the Christmas classic that casts a shadow over all the versions that follow? Nobody.  This week and next week, I'll tell the story of the song, from its writing to its place in the Christmas canon today. I'll tell the story of the song...

"Player's Ball" is a contemporary Christmas classic, but it's not very Christmas-y by design. Today, Big Boi of OutKast talks about why the song is the way it is, and how it ended up being the first solo release from the group.  After that, we have an encore segment from 2018. At the time, I talked to writer David Dennis Jr. about the song. Today, David's resumé has expanded somewhat. He recently launched the podcast Rap Stories, which features interviews with rappers about albums important...

In 2021, I talked with music journalist Alison Fensterstock and singers Dayna Kurtz and Alexandra Scott about versions of Eartha Kitt's "Santa Baby." That was a good conversation, but I still had questions and found some of my answers in other less famous Christmas songs recorded by Kitt. Those songs and some others in her repertoire filled in some blanks that we'll explore today.  This episode is based on an essay I wrote for The Daily Beast than ran on Christmas Day 2022. 

The Roches' 1990 We Three Kings is the Christmas album you'd expect from the folk trio as sing a set of holiday classics gorgeously, often a cappella, and occasionally with their tongues ever so delicately in their cheeks.  Terre Roche remembers their Christmas shows, the Caroling Carolers, and getting shooed off the sidewalk in front of Trump Tower in a conversation about singing with her sisters. The occasion for the conversation is Christmas and the release of Kin Ya See That Sun by Terre...

This week's episode features indie Christmas music--indie hip-hop with DJ and producer Amerigo Gazaway, British indie rock with Les Bicyclettes de Belsize's Charlie Darling, and British music journalist Kevin McGrath, who compiled 108 indie Christmas tracks for Have Yourself a Merry Indie Christmas Volume 1 and Volume 2. All of their music is available now on Bandcamp. Right now, Amerigo is also selling a limited edition vinyl pressing of his A Christmas Album paired with a vinyl pressing of...

With Christmas approaching, it's time when I have more good conversations than I have weeks until December 25. Today, I have two conversations that I really enjoyed, one with Dennis Diken of rock band The Smithereens, and one with Jim Goodwin, who runs the indie rock Christmas website ChristmasUnderground.com. The Smithereens' 2007 Christmas album Christmas with The Smithereens was released on vinyl this holiday season, and Goodwin has been busy posting new and new-to-you indie Christmas...

British pop/soul singer Joss Stone released Merry Christmas, Love earlier this year, and it's a bit of a departure for her as she set out to make a "posh" album, something on the surface very different from the music she's known for.  It's still very much a personal project, down to the influence of her daughter and the son she was pregnant with while recording the album. We talked about the ways that personal choices show up in a project as big and orchestrated as Merry Christmas, Love.  In...

In 2020, I had a good conversation with Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips about the surprising amount of Christmas music they have, starting with Atlas Eets Christmas, which they recorded and credited to "Imagene Peise." We talked about that album's origins, which make sense when you hear them, as well as the Christmas on Mars project and a host of other holiday one-offs the band has recorded. I ran this conversation that fall, but since I'm on family vacation this Thanksgiving week, I'm...

Laurie Berkner had one of those days when we got together to talk. A plumber came to work on her bathroom while we did our interview, and his work is the occasional backdrop for our conversation.  Still, the children's music artist talked at length about the making of her second Christmas album, Another Laurie Berkner Christmas, and the way making music for children affects her art. She's part of a generation that grew up with rock 'n' roll and makes music true enough to its spirit that...

In 2020, I interviewed Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker of the indie rock band Low, whose 1999 album Christmas is one of the great indie Christmas albums, and a bold one because rock bands didn't record Christmas music at the time--at least not like that. Maybe they'd contribute a track to a label promo compilation, but they wouldn't tie their financial and artistic futures to such an unlikely project.  Low's music at the time was dubbed "slowcore," and while it wasn't necessarily slow, they did...

Vince Guaraldi scholar Derrick Bang wrote the liner notes for the 2022 Super Deluxe edition of the soundtrack for A Charlie Brown Christmas, and this week he talks about the 1965 cartoon, Guaraldi, and the soundtrack album sessions included in the digital and CD packages.  The digital version is out now and up on streaming platforms, and it includes the original 1965 mix, a new mix, and all of the sessions that have been found so far. The CD version also includes a Blu-Ray disc with the...

Last year, Canadian folk artist Bruce Cockburn belated launched a tour celebrating 50 years in music. When we ran an excerpt from this interview last Christmas season, we started off talking about the tour. Since he's not on tour now, I cut some of that material but did start with a conversation on how someone with 50-plus years in the business relates to the music he wrote decades ago.  We focused our attention on Christmas, his 1993 album of Christmas music. We talk about its humble...

In 2008, the garage rock legends The Fleshtones released a Christmas album, Stocking Stuffer, and in true Fleshtones fashion, they made Christmas sound like them. Since 1976, they have delivered a brand of garage rock influenced by punk, R&B and soul with more than a hint of glam in their style and sound.  In this interview from 2021, singer Peter Zaremba talks about the album, its origins, and what was most important to them while working on it. He also talks about where the audiences...

One of my favorite Christmas albums of 2021 was Merry Christmas from José James, which featured the jazz vocalist in a classic quartet that included pianist Aaron Parks.  We talked in 2021 and ran part of the conversation last holiday season, but we covered a lot of ground, some of it COVID-related but a lot of it focused on James and the way he bridges musical genres. We chew on jazz, hip-hop, and some of the subtle challenges involved in making Christmas music. The music's good, but I also...

The world met Julian Koster as part of the Elephant 6 Collective in the 1990s, when he played a variety of instruments with Neutral Milk Hotel, Olivia Tremor Control, Elf Power, and his own projects, The Music Tapes and The Orbiting Human Circus. In 2008, he released The Singing Saw at Christmastime, and part of the conceit is that the saws actually do the singing. He's not playing the saws; he's encouraging them to sing. That element of whimsy is part of the fun of Koster's projects and our...

The Cowsills answer a number of pop culture trivia questions, starting with "What real life family pop band inspired the 1970 television show, The Partridge Family?" They had hits with "The Rain, The Park, and Other Things"--best known for the refrain, "I love the flower girl"--and "Hair," but the experience took a toll on family members, particularly Susan Cowsill's older brothers. She was a kid along for the ride and still under 10 when it hit, but as she talks about during our...

Documentary filmmaker Mitchell Kezin released the movie Jingle Bell Rocks! in 2013. In it, he focused on the human side of Christmas music, whether with the musicians who make the music--much the same way we do on 12 Songs--or by talking to collectors about the music they're passionate about. Last year, I talked to Kezin about the movie and his Christmas music collection, and ran part of the conversation during the holiday season.  This week, I'm running a longer, more complete version of...