Various Artists: This Warm December, A Brushfire Holiday Vol. 1
Various Artists: This Warm December, A Brushfire Holiday Vol. 1
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Wednesday, 19, Nov 2008 03:09
Brushfire Records, out November 24th.
In a nutshell...
Summer. Surfing. Christmas. Campfire. Singalongs.
What's it all about?
Jack Johnson gathers his friends around the campfire and persuades them to play some old Christmas classics with a Hawaiian twist, while throwing in a few originals for good measure. Clocking in at just over half an hour this offering is definitely on the short side, but with sugary surf rock that's this sickly sweet, that may not be a bad thing.
Who's it by?
A Brushfire records family affair, this Christmas compilation features contributions from most of the members of the Brushfire family, including their first female artist, the Malaysian Zee Avi. Most of Jack's surfer-dude sidekicks have turned up on one or other of his previous albums and most of them sound very similar to the man himself - variations on a theme as it were.
As an example...
"Someday at Christmas there will be no wars"
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
While the presence of Mr Johnson on this album will be enough to put it on people's presents list, its rather unoriginal blend of picked guitars and soft harmonies is unlikely to have the critics singing its praises. It's an interesting showcase for some of the newer artists though and even the hardest nosed cynic will find it hard not to sing along to a few of the tracks here.
What the others say
"Granted, charm alone not quite enough to make the album a fantastic Christmastime collection, but it does make it worth a listen" - DrFaustus, Epinions.com
"As for the songs, I don't believe I can say one bad thing about them. There all great and fun to listen to." - Micheal C. Pisano, Amazon.com
So is it any good?
I think the fairest thing to say is that this album does exactly what it says on the tin. In Hawaii it's a "Warm December", remember, so they can just about get away with the wildly inappropriate summery vibe. But there are moments where the sugary sweetness gets too much, even for Christmas time. Jack Johnson's opener Someday at Christmas, which includes impossibly cheesy couplets about healing the world, is enough to bring out the inner Scrooge in anyone.
However, there are highlights too. Newcomer Zee Avi's smoky sultry original, No Christmas for Me, marks her out as one to watch and Brushfire regular G Love pulls a cracker out of the bag with his blues-based harmonica-driven Christmas Baby.
The stripped down acoustic arrangements of some of the classics also work well, particularly Rogue Wave's version of Christmas, from Tommy, the Who's rock opera.
All in all I found myself carried along by most of this album in spite of myself - until I got to Jack Johnson's cover of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer at the end and couldn't shake off the feeling that the next time I heard it might be through the tinny speakers in Tesco.
6/10
Tristan Kennedy