Christmas Mixes

In 2005 I’d just graduated high school. I was working over a Christmas gift for some of my good friends, and especially my choral teacher that I’ve known since 1997. I ended up with a rather traditional mix - a lot of vocal renditions of carols, mostly ripped from CDs I owned, and at pretty low quality.

How have things changed since 2005?

Well, for one thing I now pay for every song I use in a downloaded mix [edit 2022 - transitioned to Spotify]. For another, I think I’m a good deal less religious, and it shows in my music choices. I like to think I still have good taste - but a lot of tracks, like The Saddest Day of the Year, are about disillusionment, loss of faith. You can see it as early as Cold Dark Night: Winter Meditations, 2010’s mix. But there’s always a rekindling by the end, because I think that rekindling of faith, in humanity, is a lot of what Christmas spirit is.

Do your mixes have themes, or are they just tracks thrown together?

It’s a little of both, honestly. An Illegal Christmas was my first mix in 2005. I downloaded and referenced a lot of things in that - including the cover, which is from the CBS Special logo that came on before Christmas specials in 1989. 2007’s mix Christmas Cartoons follows a lot in the same vein.

An Effed Up Christmas, that’s from 2009 when I was working retail, and the radio was so awful but you got these songs stuck in your head. I knew when I looked back on 2009, I’d remember those earworms, so I put them on the mix to commemorate that time.

2010’s Cold Dark Night: Winter Meditations is about finding that spark of light in the darkness of winter, and it’s actually meant to be listened to in the days between Halloween and December, that are so hard to avoid cheery holiday music.

Then I feel like 2011’s Friendly Ghosts of Christmas Past bookends with that - it digs into those older grooves, and kind of milks the old school Christmas season’s hits and feelings. You’ve got some new tracks on there, but a lot of older, more familiar ones. There’s even a smooth Herb Alpert track to finish that one off.

Merry Christmas From Stephanie, 2012, and Christmas in July 2013, are on a theme of, “If Wes Anderson made a Christmas movie, what would the soundtrack sound like?” So there’s a lot of weird ones on there. In 2013 also I threw together Jingle Beat. Jingle Beat is about juxtaposition of rhythm, and I hope every track is surprising. I even included a couple of my own songs at the end.

Then there’s a gap in 2014, where I let the year’s playlist marinate for two years. The result of that is the high pop opera, Rudolph’s Xmas Eve Flying Playlist. Every track is meant to put a smile on your face and a spring in your step. There’s a lot of humor - like Sleigh Ride, the Blenders’ cover of Lou Reed’s Walk on the Wild Side, or The Twelve Days of Christmas, which ends up becoming a cover of Africa by Toto.

2016 was a rough year for my family. 2017’s mix, The Lord of the Dance (Christmas Feels) is a result of 2016’s marination and tracks that warm and bring family together. The picture depicts the family shenanigans in an early 90s Christmas, with all of us together not decorating, but dancing.

2018 brings us to Xmas Spex (A Rockin Tribute to Rude Dog) and Musica Caliente de Navidad. The first is an homage to my dad and his taste, and the second is a mostly instrumental collection of Christmas music with Latin heat.

In 2019, I tried to bring together an eclectic mix that is nonetheless a great backdrop for intimate Christmas gatherings entitled Christmas Present. 2020’s mix, A Hot Toddy in These Desperate Times, is, despite the incendiary cover, the easiest listening of the bunch.

2020 of course gave me more time than needed for one mix, so it resulted in two. The second is called Last Minute Bopping and it's all the hits I could stand to put on one mix - it had to get me through the last of the year seeing my family through a video chat window.

We lived through that year alright, and then 2021’s mixes (paired together like wine and cheese) entitled Double Feature: BAH HUMBUG! / XXX-MAS are thematically similar to their titles. BAH HUMBUG! the first half, is a jaded, grinchy take on the season, and XXX-MAS is deemed inappropriate for children under 17 due to excessive content of a sexual nature. It sprang from what we jokingly called “Thirsty Holiday” on Pandora, a station that played, among other things, Wishlist, which has in it the lyrics “wanna be your ho ho ho this Christmas.” We laughed until we cried; it had to be added.

Lolly Jolly Christmas is the culmination of an attitude of wanting to put on everything I didn't have the courage to put on other mixes - such as John Coltrane's version of My Favorite Things. That brings us to 2023's mix, entitled Wrapped. I never really finalize these until the last minute; but this one I've been working on all year. I think I'm becoming more bold in my choices - but don't let that phase you, it's got some lovely moments sure to warm your heart or help you get into the Christmas groove.

Do you have any other rules that govern this madness?

I try to make every track follow the next in a logical way. It doesn’t always end up that way. I try to start with a bang, cool that off, and end with an emotional catharsis. Maybe some afterglow if you’re lucky. A mix is a lot like an essay, only more fun.

What's your favorite Christmas song?

I really love Sleigh Ride. Maybe one day I’ll include the Boston Pops version (the one true version) on one of my mixes [2023 edit: it's on 2020's Last Minute Bopping]. I love the whip cracks, and the wood block hooves, and the brass whinny.

What do you want us to take away from all this?