Hip Christmas

Welcome To Hip Christmas! I think you'll enjoy my dysfunctionally vast web archive dedicated to holiday music that rocks, rolls, swings, and twangs. If you do, please support me by shopping at Amazon, Apple Music, and Sheet Music Plus! Regardless, the best of the season to you - no matter what month it is! [about me]

What Was New In 2024? Last year's new Christmas albums included lots of vinyl reissues, big names like Jennifer Hudson and Little Big Town, indie darlings like Dean & Britta and Phantom Planet, a full-length Tower Of Power album, a new collection from the Carpenters, and yet another Bear Family compilation. I've completed my annual obsessive, quixotic attempt to keep up with it all, including my Top 10 Albums and Top 25 Singles. [gimme gimme]

The Christmas Jukebox. My online Christmas music player is bulging with over 900 hip tunes - and counting! You can listen to the music I write about - the coolest, weirdest, and loudest holiday songs ever, all while enjoying my inimitable prose - or not! [press play]

My Face, Your Book. There's a lot of holiday hilarity going on over at Facebook, in case you can't get enough on my website - or vice versa. Check out the Hip Christmas page, and follow me for maximum holiday fun all year long. No Russian trolls, please. I also post cool cover art on Instagram and Pinterest. [follow me]

My Little Brain Isn't Very Bright. Like a lot of their catalog, the holiday music of NRBQ consists of some real gems surrounded by frequently discordant, consistently amusing noise. In this case, we have one true classic ("Christmas Wish"), a handful of keepers, and a lot of stuff that sounds like Chuck Berry crossed with Ornette Coleman. [read more]

A Christmas Guitar Fantasy. The prickly heart of John Fahey grew three sizes when faced with the true meaning of Christmas. His quiet but intense acoustic holiday music has remained a touchstone for decades. He recorded a bunch of it, but the two albums he recorded for Takoma Records in 1968 and 1975 are the core of his work. [read more]

Not-So-Smooth Grooves. Rhino Records' Smooth Grooves: A Sensual Christmas is a contradiction. First, lots of the songs aren't smooth at all - they're uptempo R&B jams. Second, it fails to live up to the standards set by Rhino's series of historic Christmas compilations - even though all 12 tracks are essential holiday listening. [read more]

Green And Red Onions. Stax Records released a huge amount of classic rhythm 'n' blues in the 1960's. Booker T. & The MG's played on most of it, including the 1968 classic Soul Christmas. When the Memphis Group cut their own holiday album, they struck the perfect balance between easy listening and sweet soul. [read more]

Yulesville U.S.A. The collective brilliance of Motown's holiday music was one of my first - and certainly abiding - fascinations. The 1973 compilation A Motown Christmas is all most people will need. But, there's a lot more, including Top 20 Albums by the Temptations, the Jackson 5, and Smokey Robinson & The Miracles. [read more]

Merry Gentlemen, Start Your Engines! An adjunct to the Hot Rod Rock series, Hot Rod Holiday (1997) collected 16 festive songs by vintage rock artists popular with grease monkeys and the ladies who love them. Only one song is actually about a car, but most Christmas collectors (and gearheads) will enjoy the hell out of it. [read more]

Hooray For Santa Claus! Rhino Records' Punk Rock Xmas is not your normal Christmas compilation. These are songs for people who love to hate Christmas - 18 slices of noise ranging from relative superstars like the Ramones, the Damned, and the Dickies to forgotten heroes like Fear, Pansy Division, and Celibate Rifles. [read more]

Go To Rhino Records! From a small record shop in Los Angeles came - eventually - the very foundation of this website. Across 20 years, Rhino Records released nearly two dozen compilations that wrote the history of recorded Christmas music in the 20th century and transformed my curiosity into obsession. [read more]

An Offer You Can't Refuse. Mob-connected New York indie Roulette Records waxed a treasure trove of doo wop, girl groups, rhythm & blues, and jazz in the 1950's and 1960's. All of that is on display on Westside's 1998 CD compilation, Christmas Past, alongside novelty songs of unspeakable weirdness. Let's spin the wheel! [read more]

Follow Me To Christmasland. In the 1990's, elderly crooner Tony Bennett made a big comeback and, happily, that included the rediscovery of his fine 1968 Christmas album Snowfall. In the coming years, he'd make more - but he never topped his first foray onto holiday music. [read more]

Matthew Sweet On Quaaludes. Long ago, I bought two albums and wrote a whole review - for just one song. In my defense, it was a pretty good song, but I assumed the band and the song had been long forgotten. Then, I learned that The Zest of Yore had endured, moved to my hometown, and the drummer lived a couple of doors down! [read more]

Run - Don't Walk. The Ventures' 1965 Christmas Album is a widely acknowledged classic - and #2 on my Top 20 Albums. What makes it so special is the way the band melds hits of the day with holiday classics. You haven't lived until you've heard the Beatles' "I Feel Fine" segue seamlessly into "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer." [read more]

Not-So-Easy Listening. I had to put on a new set of ears to appreciate Rhino's Santamental Journey: Pop Vocal Christmas Classics (1995). This is literally my parents' music. But, Rhino sticks to artists of distinction and performances brimming with personality and charm, so the album swings much harder than you'd expect. [read more]

Actually Very Special. After years of increasingly awful sequels, it's easy to forget what a big deal A Very Special Christmas was back in 1987. It spawned more than a few hip holiday classics, but its biggest impact was the slew of Christmas music that followed in its wake - and continues unabated to this day. [read more]

Christmas Is Coming. Is there any holiday album as universally beloved as Vince Guaraldi's 1965 soundtrack to A Charlie Brown Christmas? None springs to mind. To me, what makes it so special isn't that it's a jazz classic, nor that it's a timeless holiday treasure. It's special because it's both. [read more]

A Christmas Gift For You. Every year, I offer free MP3's from my voluminous collection - all unavailable easily or legitimately in the music marketplace. In 2024, I revisited the legendary, exceedingly rare Flagpole Christmas albums, filling in some gaping holes and sprucing up the sound quality. [listen or download]