Here we are and well, well, well, it’s December next week. Don’t be fooled by the slight upswing in the weather, Christmas is still a-comin’ down the tracks and there are only two, maybe three, things to do. Fight against it – that’ll do no good. Panic – well, it’ll still arrive and you’ll be unprepared. Or, accept it, embrace it, fall under its spell – but how to do that? Well, the tried and true methods remain the most reliable – eggnog, mince pie and some music that fits with a mood that’s all yule. Yule like it. We’re sure yule will.
And another tradition that we can observe is featuring the new festive release from Joe Normal – power-popster most of the year, he regularly drops a Winterval themed song around this time of year, and on ‘Fabulous Christmas‘ he evokes the fab four, as he encourages us to “have a fabulous Christmas / from Liverpool to wherever you are.” Since Americana UK Towers is also in that Mersey adjacent city what could be more appropriate?
Anne Buckle is a cousin to June Carter Cash and the great, great niece of A.P. Carter so it should surprise no-one that her CV proclaims her to be “Nashville-based Americana/Country artist, songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist“. She’s also an alumni of Harvard. But, for our purposes today the important thing is that Anne Buckle was inspired by “those Hallmark movie moments that remind us love is what makes the holidays truly magical – not the fanfare of the season, but the people nearest to our hearts” which led her to write ‘Christmas To Me‘ where she declares that “your love is all the magic I need“. Which is just as well, as we’re led to believe that there’s a shortage of magic this year – something to do with climate change apparently – so Father Christmas is having to “Ho Ho Hoard It” in order to be able to make his deliveries this Christmas Eve. All true, you read it here first.
There are a lot of influences on display on Keith Secola‘s ‘Christmas Time‘ (out on Ishkōdé Records) – as the Native American Music Hall of Famer moves from a Springsteen-esque feel towards a power-pop coda all wrapped up in his own musical stylings. It’s a song that has been a while in the making, as Secola explains: “I remember when I first migrated to the southwest from Northern Minnesota, I was at the Isleta Pueblo south of Albuquerque, NM. My friend Todd Jiron sang this song on a hand drum, “A Christmas Song”. The lyrics: “It was Christmas, Christmas Morning, it was below zero, it was early in the morning, here comes the Santa Claus, Ho, ho, ho, ho hey hey-hey-da”. If you listen to the chorus you will hear it.”
Someone we enjoyed earlier this year at the Americana Music Association UK’s showcases was Logan Richard, and here he is with a festive tune that looks back nostalgically on all the winterval gatherings that have been before. He says of the song, which was written and recorded in just two days, that “I love Christmas, so I tapped into my childhood memories, sitting around the fireplace, reminiscing, and waiting for my older brothers to get home for the holidays.”
We have to caveat the next thing we’re going to share with you by explaining that there are no winners (or losers) in Jingle Bells Friday – everyone is a star. But. Well, we also have to tell you that the PEI dwelling Richard has placed ‘Stay In This Moment‘ in an episode of Hallmark’s Mistletoe Murders – and we have to state right here, and without equivocation, that you can’t get more festive than a murder solved by the owner of an year round Christmas Shop.
On ‘Joy‘ Kirby Lyle brings an upbeat folk song that resonates with seasonal vibrations – or jingling bells which somehow seems very on point. And whilst it’s true that across a thirty year career Nashville based multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter Kirby Lyle has pursued his musical passions with a blend of folk, alternative, and Americana styles perhaps the most important thing about him, and specifically about ‘Joy’, is that it features the one true element that distinguishes the great Winterval song from the ho-hum run of the mill bleak mid-wintery offering. Yes, ringing out we can hear that plaintive sound of the banjo. Don’t get too excited, this might be a one-off, cool yule banjo seems in short supply this year. It’s probably a tariff and barriers to commerce thing.
And that is what we’re sending you in to the last weekend before December with, and although everything seems to be very “merry and bright” at the moment we’re still expecting the “we broke up at Christmas” or the “why does the big meal always end in a drunken brawl?” songs very soon. Just as soon as they arrive..
