Favorite versions of holiday songs

The Drifters’ “White Christmas”:

The Temptations’ “Silent Night” is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard:

 

Trans Siberian Orchestra

 

Any version I never hear.

 

I'm guessing there must by 43,877 versions of "Sleigh Ride," because you cannot escape it on our all-Christmas stations. By far the most overplayed Christmas song over the past decade. As of last week there were two local stations going all-Christmas, and in one trip I made to the grocery store --- literally 2 miles round trip --- both stations managed to play a version.

My favorite rock version of Christmas Canon is the one with Jennifer Cella. Near the end of the song the line "On this night/on this night/on this very Christmas night" is repeated 8 times (without time to take a breath), and Jennifer manages to hold that final 8th "niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight" for 16 seconds. Remarkable.

 

They played two shows at Honda Center yesterday. I wanted to go so bad. But my wife is having vertigo symptoms and I didn't think she could handle the loudness, explosions and strobe lights. The previous night at a hockey game, she was bothered by the new strobes that are atop the scoreboard, and the too-loud bass during the warmup music.

 

Gomer Pyle...er Jim Nabors

 

Easily my favorite quote unquote modern Christmas song...quote unquote modern because it's almost 30 years old. Damn. But what a goldmine that has become for a group formed out of the little-known metal band Savatage.

 

Porky Pig's version of Blue Christmas

 

The first four albums were solid US heavy metal. They were in a middle ground of being more than hard rock but weren't touching anything Metallica or Megadeth were doing on the other end of the spectrum. They made a hard shift into theatricality on 1990's Gutter Ballet. The title track would fit right in on any TSO album.

 

As awesome as it is it owes more than a little (something I'm sure Springsteen would acknowledge) to the Crystals' seismic reworking of it on Phil Spector's Christmas album.

 

IT'S THE GUITAR BALLLLLLEEEETTTTTT

Great song but "When The Crowds Are Gone" was their masterpiece.

 

Wait, what?