Al Martino - A Merry Christmas

I was a baby when this came out. So I can't say I was a fan when it was first released. Like a lot of people, I came late to the party, really late. Sure, I knew about him from The Godfather, but that hardly counts. It was the maligned Godfather Part III and Johnny Fantane's character when he sang, "To Each His Own" that sealed it for me as an Al Martino fan. That was awesome. "Promise Me You'll Remember (Love Theme from The Godfather Part III)" was supposed to be the big crooner moment with Harry Connick Jr. but a quick A and B between Al and Harry shows the absolute gulf between them as vocalists. I like Harry, Al was simply on another level.

"To Each His Own" was supposed to be played at our wedding, except I forgot the cassette at home that had some of the songs we wanted to play. Which sucked because we wanted to exit the reception to Michael Nesmith singing "Eldorado to the Moon" and when he got to the part where he sang, "We got a million dollars worth of ethel gas / And a reservation for the room ..." we were going to wave so long and head out.

It never happened, but it was supposed to.

I blame Mr. Bean.

Seriously.

We hadn't been married very long and we had a very skinny Christmas music selection in our little apartment ... but I did have one CD, Al Martino's A Merry Christmas. It was perfect for us. The album was more or less split down the middle, with the first side featuring contemporary songs. You know, "Rudolph", "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" the obligatory version of "White Christmas" and the second side more traditional Carols.

One song, though, will always belong to Al. “You’re All I Want for Christmas” — for me, it’s the penultimate Christmas carol. Yes, I know Bing recorded it a couple of decades earlier, and his version with the Andrews Sisters is undeniably beautiful. But Al got to me first, and it’s his rendition that truly melts me.

Over the decades my collection of Christmas music grew and grew, and over the last few the number of records I've found takes up a fair bit of space. I don't mind so much. When I stumbled upon the stereo vinyl release of A Merry Christmas I couldn't help myself. I needed it more than I wanted it, and I had wanted it for some time (apologies to Jimmy Webb, I'm sure he could do better). There isn't a dud on this album, and the arrangements and performances are all so good. Al is at home with both contemporary and classic Christmas songs, delivering them with sincerity. I love this record. If push came to shove and I had to pick only one Christmas album to save ... it would be this one.

For over thirty years, on Christmas Eve, "You're All I Want for Christmas" is the song I dance to with my wife. The only light in the room comes from the Christmas tree — it's generally pretty late, after we’ve put the kids to bed and everything is ready for the morning. This is our moment. This is our song. I may not have been able to play "To Each His Own" at our wedding, but I think this makes up for it.

Styx - Paradise Theater

Styx was hands down one of my favourite bands as a kid. They were a strange band, even back then. They were a hard rock band, almost progressive at times, who had a penchant for sucky ballads. I know there's a tendency for people to zero in on "Babe" as the song that killed the band's credibility. The roots go way back to almost the beginning when Styx released "Lady" on their second album. It showed a side to the band that needed to be kept in check, and for the most part the band kept things on a pretty tight leash. The band had been setting a gruelling pace, releasing an album a year (two in 1972) and by the time they released Paradise Theater (if I end up writing theatre later it's because that's how we spell it here) in 1981 they'd dropped ten albums in less than a decade. I snapped this up as soon as I saw it, and it became a fixture on my turntable. Like the band had announced on "Borrowed Time" from 1979's Cornerstone , ...

Billy Rankin - Growin' Up Too Fast

Growin' Up Too Fast was never widely released on CD (if at all), and it was one of the albums I really wanted to get back after a basement flood wiped out my vinyl collection in the '90s (when no one really gave a shit about records, and my insurance gave me a couple hundred bucks for an appraised $10,000 collection). Way back in 1984, my (dearly departed and greatly missed) buddy Dave let me borrow his cassette copy, which included a bonus track of "Get It On (Bang A Gong)." When I eventually bought the album, I didn't know it was a bonus track, or even what a bonus track was. If that sentence was hard to read, just go back and skim it. I'm sure you'll get the gist. I'd find out later Billy was an off-and-on-again member of Nazareth and wrote some absolutely killer songs for them. At the time, though, all I knew was this guy laid it out cold with the opening cut, "Baby Come Back," then proceeded to lay down one killer tune after another bef...

Garfield - Strange Streets

I'd seen this before in the bin, but kept flipping through the stacks. I'd see it a few more times, each time stopping to look at it a little more. There was something kind of cool about the cover where the stylized Celtic knot had the dotted yellow line - it was a strange street for sure. I pulled the record out of the jacket and I was struck by the centre image. There was the familiar Mercury label, the same one I'd seen a thousand times on BTO's Head On album. Well, I'd bought things based on odd associations before - like when I had to buy anything that Solid Rock Records released (this was generally a good thing) - so who knows, maybe this was a hidden gem. There weren't any real scratches or rash, just a lot of dirt and dust. It seemed to clean up okay, but we'll see how it goes. The album opens with the title track, and this wasn't straight-ahead pop or rock. It was leaning toward the progressive, but with a pop bent. Oddly enough, the vocals rem...

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