A Christmas show with selected songs from various artists bracketing The Jethro Tull Christmas Album, a terrific 2003 studio release by one of my favorite bands. As Tull leader Ian Anderson says in the liner notes: “If you liked (the song) Bouree and the Songs From The Wood record, you will love this Jethro Tull Christmas Album. The aim was to find some uplifting traditional Christmas carols, some new songs and to re-record some old Tull pieces on the Christmas topic.”

Tull’s aim was true, as the album hits the bull’s-eye. It’s a Christmas album but an atypical one – indeed harkening back to the 1977 album Songs From The Wood – thanks to the group’s typically outstanding musicianship that results in what is a great folk-rock record, regardless its theme. It stands on its own considerable merits in the band’s catalogue.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Song clips on my Facebook page And listen to the show in the audio logs posted above.

1. Elton John, Step Into Christmas
2. Emerson, Lake & Palmer, I Believe In Father Christmas
3. The Kinks, Father Christmas
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The Jethro Tull Christmas Album

1. Birthday Card At Christmas
2. Holly Herald
3. A Christmas Song
4. Another Christmas Song
5. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
6. Jack Frost And The Hooded Crow
7. Last Man At The Party
8. Weathercock
9. Pavane
10. First Snow On Brooklyn
11. Greensleeved
12. Fire At Midnight
13. We Five Kings
14. Ring Out Solstice Bells
15. Bouree
16. A Winter Snowscape
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4. Roy Orbison, Pretty Paper
5. Elvis Presley, Blue Christmas
6. Bob Dylan, Here Comes Santa Claus
7. AC/DC, Mistress For Christmas
8. Paul McCartney/Wings, Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reggae
9. Chuck Berry, Run Rudolph Run
10. Chuck Berry, Merry Christmas Baby
11. Eagles, Please Come Home For Christmas
12. John Lennon/Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band with The Harlem Community Choir, Happy Xmas (War Is Over)

My track-by-track tales:

1. Elton John, Step Into Christmas . . . Up-tempo pop tune, upbeat lyrics celebrating the season, a happy song EJ released as a single in late November, 1973. It made No. 8 on the UK regular charts and No. 1 on US Billboard’s Christmas singles chart. Starting in 2007 it’s been released in the UK most Christmas seasons and continues to chart, ranging anywhere from the top 10 to the top 100. Just this past week it was re-released as a parody video starring actor and model Cara Delevingne, who plays a young Elton in a new take incorporating the new video with the original. The song itself was added, as a bonus track, to the 1995 reissue of the 1974 album Caribou and has also appeared on various compilations.

2. Emerson, Lake & Palmer, I Believe In Father Christmas . . . The beautiful voice of Greg Lake on a track that appeared on ELP’s Works Volume 2 album, 1977.

3. The Kinks, Father Christmas . . . A non-album single rocker from 1977 and not your typical happy Christmas song. Rather, it’s trademark Ray Davies’ ascerbic social commentary. To wit:

When I was small I believed in Santa Claus
Though I knew it was my dad
And I would hang up my stocking at Christmas
Open my presents and I’d be glad
But the last time I played Father Christmas
I stood outside a department store
A gang of kids came over and mugged me
And knocked my reindeer to the floor
They said
Father Christmas, give us some money
Don’t mess around with those silly toys
We’ll beat you up if you don’t hand it over
We want your bread so don’t make us annoyed
Give all the toys to the little rich boys
But give my daddy a job ’cause he needs one
He’s got lots of mouths to feed

Have yourself a merry merry Christmas
Have yourself a good time
But remember the kids who got nothin’
While you’re drinkin’ down your wine

Dave Davies, Ray’s brother and Kinks’ lead guitarist, on the song, in the liner notes to a compilation it appears on: “I love the humor of it, and the aggression and bitternesss of it. People do think like that at Christmas, especially people who grew up in an environment where . . . not that we were poor or anything, we were just a regular working-class house.”

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The Jethro Tull Christmas Album

1. Birthday Card At Christmas . . . A new track, at least it was in 2003, written by Ian Anderson. Fine flute playing throughout on one of the heavier numbers on the album. Anderson said he was inspired to write it due to his daughter’s birthday being close to and, as can be the case, overshadowed by Christmas.

People have showered me with presents
While their minds were fixed on other things
Sleigh bells, bearded red suit uncles, pointy trees and angel wings
I am the shadow in your Christmas. I am the corner of your smile
Perfunctory in celebration. You offer content but no style

2. Holly Herald . . . An instrumental medley, arranged by Anderson, comprised of the traditional British folk Christmas carol The Holly and the Ivy and Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

3. A Christmas Song . . . A single from 1968, redone but retaining (how could they not?) the classic spoken word ending “Hey! Santa! Pass us that bottle, will you?” by Tull’s 2003 lineup – Anderson (flute, vocals, acoustic guitars, mandolin, piccolo), guitarist Martin Barre, drummer Doane Perry, bassist Jonathan Noyce and keyboardist Andrew Giddings. A tight and cohesive unit from 1995-2006, it was one of the longest serving of the many Tull lineups over the years. It’s the version of Tull I saw most often live in my many concert experiences with the band.

4. Another Christmas Song . . . Another redo of a previous release. Another Christmas Song, a mid-tempo tune with lyrics, in part, about an old man thinking of his children, first appeared on the 1989 album Rock Island.

5. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen . . . Arranged by Anderson as an instrumental.

6. Jack Frost And The Hooded Crow . . . A redo of a 1986 single, about helping those in need at Christmas, that also appeared on the 1988 box set 20 Years Of Jethro Tull.

7. Last Man At The Party . . . A new song written for the Christmas album, a lively tune about celebrating the season.

Sister Bridget by the stair… a glass of wine and she’s almost there.
Cousin Jimmy at the door… another beer and he’s on the floor.
Friends and neighbours come around,
waste no time we’re heaven-bound.
But not before we raise a glass to good camaraderie. . .

So make yourselves jolly under mistletoe, holly and ivy.
Get to it – and be in good cheer.
And when it’s all over… pigs gone to clover –
Will the last man at the party wish me a happy New Year.

8. Weathercock . . . Beautiful song, originally released on the 1978 album Heavy Horses, the middle record in the so-called rustic trio of mostly folk rock Tull records that began with Songs From The Wood in 1977 and ended with Stormwatch in 1979. That said, I’ve never felt Stormwatch – which was arguably ahead of its time with some of its focus on environmental among other societal concerns – quite fits with the other two. It’s darker, still folk in spots but heavier overall. I didn’t warm to it at first but Stormwatch, as albums can tend to do, has grown on me over repeat listens.

9. Pavane . . . Written by French composer Gabriel Faure in 1887 and titled after a Spanish processional dance common in Europe during the Renaissance. It features flute among the instruments played, perfect for Tull in this arrangement by Ian Anderson.

10. First Snow On Brooklyn . . . Thought-provoking lyrical imagery tied to the title. You can visualize the light snow falling en route to becoming a blizzard as the protagonist of the piece returns to the New York City borough, questioning his decision to do so, apparently in a lament for the might have beens of a relationship.

I flew in on the evening plane
Is it such a good idea that I’m here again?
And I could cut my cold breath with a knife
and taste the winter of another life

A yellow cab from JFK, the long way round
I didn’t mind; it gave me thinking time before I ran aground
on rocky memories and choking tears
I believe it only rained round here these thirty years

Now it’s the first snow on Brooklyn and my cold feet are drumming
You don’t see me in the shadows from your cozy window frame
And last night, who was in your parlour wrapping presents in the late hour to place upon your pillow as the morning came?

. . . And the snow covers my footprints, deep regrets and heavy heartbeats; when you wake you’ll never see the spot that I was standing on . . . some things are best forgotten; some are better half-remembered. I just thought that I might be there, on your Christmas night.

The song epitomizes to me the quality and depth of the album and why I termed it an atypical Christmas album. It’s not simply a rock band doing Christmas carols, though they are part of the song lineup in various forms arranged by the group. It goes beyond that, songs that are set in the snow of the season but using Christmas as a vehicle to comment on the human condition.

11. Greensleeved . . . The classic traditional English folk song Greensleeves, done in so many ways by so many over the years, here retitled slightly, and arranged in instrumental form by Ian Anderson.

12. Fire At Midnight . . . The closing track on the original release of the Songs From The Wood album, redone by the 2003 version of Tull. Nothing really to do with Christmas but it fits the folk rock, traditional tune theme and to reiterate what Ian Anderson says in his liner notes to the Christmas album, if you liked Songs From The Wood, you’ll feel the same way about the Christmas album.

13. We Five Kings . . . We Three Kings, arranged by Anderson in instrumental form and cheekily retitled because there were five guys in the Tull band at the time. As for We Three Kings, I always remember the version my late father had on his reel-to-reel Sony tape deck through the late 1960s into the 1970s. I often talk about my older brother as a huge influence on me in terms of the rock and roll I listen to and embraced, and he was, but so was dad in the sense that music in all its forms was always playing thanks to his love of opera, classical and . . . American country music from the likes of Johnny Cash and Glen Campbell.

Anyway, back to We Three Kings and my dad’s version: Each of the wise men sings his verse, speaking of the gift he brings to baby Jesus in Bethlehem and then comes a big, booming voice . . . “And Gaspar spoke . . . ” It’s just so powerful, not just that specific part but the whole thing and has stuck with me since those childhood days whenever I hear or think of We Three Kings.

14. Ring Out Solstice Bells . . . Another one redone by the 2003 Tull lineup of a track originally on Songs From The Wood. It mentions mistletoe but again, one of those Tull ‘Christmas’ songs that isn’t a carol but fits the context of the album perfectly.

15. Bouree . . . One of the perpetually popular Jethro Tull instrumental pieces, by Johann Sebastian Bach and originally adapted and released on Tull’s second studio album, Stand Up, from 1969. It’s redone for the Christmas album by the 2003 version of Tull.

16. A Winter Snowscape . . . A rare composition, this one an instrumental by guitarist Martin Barre, on a Tull album that is not written by leader/chief songwriter/focal point Ian Anderson. Together in Tull since the second album, Stand Up, the longtime collaborators had something of an acrimonious split in 2011. That’s when Anderson decided to put Tull on apparently permanent hold and proceed as a solo artist, which he had done previously while pursuing parallel careers. In the end what resulted in 2017 was Anderson essentially rebranding his solo band as a new version of Tull which has since released two studio albums without Barre, who unlike Anderson is not a songwriter of note but has been touring Tull’s catalogue as a live solo act.

An interesting and compelling album, Tull’s Christmas offering. It was done at the behest of a record company executive who, according to Ian Anderson’s liner notes, emailed him two days before Christmas 2002, suggesting a Tull Christmas album for the following year. Anderson, who says he had considered the idea over time, got down to it and we have the results. The original 2003 release was reissued earlier this month as a five-disc box set including two concerts on CD and a blu-ray disc of the shows.

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4. Roy Orbison, Pretty Paper . . . Written by Willie Nelson, it became a hit for Orbison in 1963. A tale of a lonely street vendor selling pencils and paper on the streets as busy Christmas shoppers swirl around him, oblivious, uncaring, it could easily have been titled Pretty Pauper.

5. Elvis Presley, Blue Christmas . . . From Elvis’ Christmas Album, released in 1957 and considered a classic of such seasonal songs. “I’ll have a blue Christmas, without you . . . ”

6. Bob Dylan, Here Comes Santa Claus . . . From his 2009 album Christmas In The Heart. Like anything/everything with the enigmatic Dylan, there’s a WTF? aspect to it all but every artist seems to do a Christmas album, in one form or other, so why not Mr. Zimmerman, by this point, croaky voice and all? It’s good, bad, fun, funny, ridiculous and he’s obviously in on the joke, so what the hell?

7. AC/DC, Mistress For Christmas . . . So, you see, Dylan sings of Santa Claus coming and AC/DC has a request of the jolly ol’ elf. Typical tongue in cheek lewd and yeah maybe dumb or crass but so what, it’s AC/DC, from the 1990 album The Razors Edge.

“I just can’t wait ’til Christmastime when I can grope you in the hay” and “I want the woman in red at the bottom of my bed . . . Mistress for Christmas I can hear you coming down my smoke stack, yeah I want to ride on your reindeer, honey, and ring my bells, yeah” As lead singer Brian Johnson was once quoted as saying, “We’re a filthy band.”

8. Paul McCartney/Wings, Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reggae . . . Instrumental cover of the perennial Christmas song by noted American holiday standards writer Johnny Marks (look him up, extensive catalog of such tunes) with a slight title twist. McCartney recorded it in 1975, it appeared as a 1979 single and was a bonus track on expanded editions of the 1979 Wings album Back To The Egg.

9. Chuck Berry, Run Rudolph Run . . . Typical Chuck Berry rocker, themed to Christmas.

10. Chuck Berry, Merry Christmas Baby . . . I couldn’t decide between two Chuck Berry tunes so I’m playing them both, provided I can squeeze them into the time slot. This one’s a deep blues of the sort for which Berry isn’t usually widely recognized. Check out the 2003 compilation of his early blues material, Chuck Berry Blues, for further evidence of his bona fides.

11. Eagles, Please Come Home For Christmas . . . Holiday single from 1978 of the song made famous by blues great Charles Brown, who, along with “the Queen of R & B” Ruth Brown (unrelated) I saw open for Bonnie Raitt in 1995 in Toronto as part of Raitt’s North American tour.

12. John Lennon/Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band with The Harlem Community Choir, Happy Xmas (War Is Over) . . .

So this is Christmas
And what have you done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
And so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young
A very Merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let’s hope it’s a good one
Without any fear

And on that note . . .