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Showing posts from 2015

Most Depressing Christmas Songs

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Are you not feeling t he Christmas spirit? Here's our guide t o alternative musics most miserable Christmas songs. I Believe In Father Christmas - Six By Seven Just like the weather in Liverpool right now it there is no snow it just keeps on raining in the decidedly grumpy Greg Lake cover. (Weather update 2 years later and it's still a horrible sleet like rain) Hurts - All I want for Christmas is new years day. Wishing Christmas all away are Hurts here, they've had quite enough already . Gruff Rhys - Slashed Wrists This Chris tmas. What could be more depressing than suicide . The Super Furry Animals lead singer takes the subject head on. Adrian Moffat - Plastic Mistletoe Our favourite miserable Scot sounds like he's singing direct to the bottom of his whiskey glass.   Bright Eyes - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas Anyone who has seen Meet me in St Louis knows this is not the cheery Christmas tune it's often presented as. Even so Connor Oberst

10 Coolest Christmas songs in the world right now 2015

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A few years back a Beth Ditto Christmas song was the coolest thing that could possibility happen. Much as I like that tune a lacklustre last album and few years since The Gossip released anything that excited us, has left that song no where near as cool. So here is my list of the coolest xmassongs right now, I plan to do a list every year as songs and artist get cooler or new artists appear. The main criteria is that I think the song and artist are cool. It's worth mentioning here that I am based in the UK. Some of these bands will not be cool anywhere else. Furthermore it's about who is cool to me right now. This does not mean that the songs or the artist are the best, they will not all be cool next year and my taste is notoriously bad anyway. Check it out below, agree with me or not? Let me know in the comments or @xmassongblog on twitter. 10 Shins - Wonderful Christmastime Every students indie rock favourite start off our list even if it's been 3 years since we la

Phoenix - Alone on Christmas Day

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So the mystery is over and we get French band Phoenix's Christmas song. It's straight off the Phoenix song book, it's mid-tempo keyboard drenced strum along pop song with drums that sound like a drum machine but probably are not. Apparently it's a Beach Boys cover but it's a new one on me. Check it out beong and they buy it. We here love a charity single and this one it raising money for Unicef. Amazon

Alternative Christmas Music: 2015's playlist

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Finally here, it's my 2015 playlist of alternative Christmas music. If you don't already know every year since 2004 I have created a playlist of Indie and alternative Christmas music to send to my friends instead of Christmas cards. These are the songs I will be sending this year. Of course alot of the songs were released in previous years because I have had to put the lists together before December begins so I can send them and the recipients have a chance to play them before December is over. Let me know what you think, and if you know of a good tune I've not got here get in touch via email xmassongblog@outlook.com or @xmassongblog on twitter. Here's the list with a link and video party going on below. 1 CHVRCHES - Stay Another Day 2 Summer Camp - Last Christmas 3 Ladyhawke - Merry Xmas Everyone 4 Bombay Bicycle Club - In the Bleak Midwinter 5 Shins - Wonderful Christmastime 6 Lisa Hannigan - River 7 Sufjan Steven - Christmas In The Room 8 The Polyphonic

Palma Violets / Summer Camp with new Christmas tunes

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I mean honestly, how is one supposed to write a blog on Christmas songs when the girlfriend keeps breaking the computer. Anyways the drip drip drip of indie Christmas tunes has begun.... I'll be dropping my playlist shortly but before then check out Palma Violets Christmas song. I have to admit I was not expecting this one. The South London rockers didn't really strike me as a xmassong sorta band. It's a really rather good tune with a suitably woozy video check it out below. Then there is the return of Summer Camp. They are becoming regulars round here. This year they've taken their previous covers of Christmas Wrapping and Last Christmas and filled out an EP with their new tune - I don't wanna wait til Christmas. It's a collection high of quality even if our favourite tune of theirs isn't present. So check that tune out here Then hear the lead song from the new EP here and if you like that you can get it from Amazon

Killers - Dirt Sledding and Amazon playlist.

New Christmas season, new Killers Christmas song. It's not their best effort (to our mind that's Christmas in L.A. despite what NME say ) but we commend their commitment to the Christmas song cause. It's available now via iTunes and all the best online music stores and of course all the proceeds go to the charity  (red) . Also out a couple of weeks ago was Amazon's Christmas playlist . There's Langhorne Slim's  Deck the Halls , although that's too cheery for it's own good and doesn't really suit the singer. Then there's SOAK who was last week nominated for a Mercury award. She gives a pretty straight version of  The Christmas Waltz . She's stripped back the production and it works really rather nicely. Elsewhere there is Guided by Voices singer Robert Pollard with a suitably lo-fi outing on  What begins on New Year's Day  and Turin Breaks (remember them?) doing their turn on New Year's Day Dammit people my advent calender

Hey we are back - Courteeners - Winter Wonderland

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Hey were back, been a long year and I'm sorry we are starting kinda late but we've been having computer issues in xmassongblog towers...... but then it's been a rather slow start to the xmassong season. We only cover the biggest most exciting indie releases on xmassongblog so whilst alot of our friends have plenty to put up we don't have much to show so far this season. Phoenix promised but now seem to have taken away their xmassong with Bill Murray. I'm still hopeful but not holding my breath. Then of course the Killers are going to releasing a new xmassong. All we know so far is that it will be called Dirt Sledding and it will as always be raising funds for the  (red)  charity. Finally some good news of a confirmed single we can actually listen to. The Courteeners have stepped in with Winter Wonderland. It's not the classic song but a whole new tune. It's a downbeat song alluding to the difference between the idea and the reality of fresh snow and/or a