Have Yourself A Depressing Little Christmas

Here it is, folks, the first of two CD-length mixes from me this holiday season. I had a hard time whittling this down to fit onto one CD, but the primary reason for making these two mixes in the first place was to give my friends CDs at our Christmas party. I hope this album doesn't bum you out too much -- if you're worried about it, don't listen to any of it till Tuesday, when I'll post the antidote, entitled "Have Yourself A Magical Little Christmas."

Tracklist:

01 - Judy Garland - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas
02 - Tom Waits - Silent Night / Christmas Card From A Hooker in Minneapolis (live on Austin City Limits, 12-5-78)
03 - Merle Haggard - If We Make It Through December
04 - The Everly Brothers - Christmas Eve Can Kill You
05 - Mary Gauthier - Christmas In Paradise
06 - Red Star Belgrade - Christmas Day
07 - Alan Patrick Scheurman - Holiday Song #17
08 - Okkervil River - Listening To Otis Redding At Home During Christmas
09 - Simon and Garfunkel - 7 O'Clock News / Silent Night
10 - Johnny and Jon - Christmas In Vietnam
11 - Marvin Gaye - I Want To Come Home For Christmas
12 - Casiotone For The Painfully Alone - Cold White Christmas
13 - The Long Winters - Sometimes You Have To Work On Christmas (Sometimes)
14 - The Long Blondes - Christmas Is Cancelled
15 - Aimee Mann - I Was Thinking I Could Clean Up For Christmas
16 - Joni Mitchell - River
17 - Kansas City Kitty - Christmas Morning Blues
18 - Over The Rhine - All I Ever Get For Christmas Is Blue

Zipfile

Have Yourself A Mellow Little Christmas

Here's the second of 2006's two Christmas mixes I compiled. The mixes from '06 and '07 (stay tuned!) don't have covers uploaded, since I made all the covers by hand with paper cutouts and stickers and such. I'll probably put together covers for this year's two mixes, though I'm planning to continue with the handmade covers for the hardcopies my friends get.

Now, for about as long as they've existed, I've been a fairly faithful reader of two music blogs: You Ain't No Picasso and WFMU's Beware Of The Blog. But until December '06, I hadn't bothered to explore the rest of the MP3 blogosphere. Christmas music changed all that. For the first December in recent memory, my job didn't entail dealing on a personal level with enraged customers eight hours every single day, which meant that the ever-elusive "spirit of the season" was a lot easier to find. And, when I wasn't forced to listen to Christmas music on my employer's radio station, I found that I kind of missed it. So during that month, I downloaded more than a gig of Christmas music from all the assorted MP3 blogs out there. Some of them became my new best friends, and some I only visit each December. That's why this blog owes its very existence to Christmas music. (Well, that, and my collection of "Stagger Lee.")

Tracklist:

01. Aimee Mann - The Christmas Song
02. Combusible Edison - Christmastime Is Here
03. Diana Ross and The Supremes - White Christmas
04. Simon and Garfunkel - Comfort and Joy
05. Tom Waits - Silent Night
06. Enya - Oiche Chiun (Silent Night)
07. Pedro The Lion - I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day
08. Belle and Sebastian - O Come, O Come, Emmanuel
09. Dayna Manning - It's In Every One Of Us
10. The Coctails - First Snowfall
11. Math and Physics Club - Marshmallow World
12. The Beach Boys - Morning Christmas
13. Sarah McLachlan - Song For A Winter's Night
14. Travis - River
15. Chris Isaak - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Zip file