Various Artists
A Very Cherry Christmas 5
Sunday 13th of December 2009
A Very Cherry Christmas is back for its fifth release and its packed full of its usual odd mix of songs. You would be hard pressed to find a collection as diverse (or bizarre) as this anywhere on the world and that means you'll like as many songs as you'll hate. This year, there are 21 new songs and 4 retrospectives from previous volumes.
The most ear-wrenching gift from previous years is the fantastic "strangled in the studio" rendition of 'Tyrannosaurus Rex For Christmas' by The Lovely Eggs. You won't believe this song until you hear it, but I recommend living in disbelief as it has to be the preferable option!
Allo Darlin' supply us with something different, a folky but festive 'Space Christmas', which is actually a very sweet song.
Other good songs include 'Christmas Number One' from The 10p Mixes, 'Unhappy New Year' from Detox Cute and The Beauty Junkies, 'It Was Christmas That Killed Us' from Heats!Attack,
Meanwhile, not-so-good songs appear in the form of 'Stop The Revelry' from The Shrags, 'Jethro (Song For)' by Shrieking Violets and Fever Fever's awful rendition of 'Little Drummer Boy' (to be fair, I don't like the original either).
The worst song this year (amazingly beating The Lovely Eggs to the finish line by a surprising margin) is 'Summery Toys (Winter Version)' from Marble Krusher. This song is beyond lo-fi and is actually rather painful.
The most genuinely "Christmas" song has to be the classic sounding 'Mistletoe Misadventure' from The Gresham Flyers, which captures some of the most traditional tunes inside it's dark-indie sound.
A special mention should also go to the kitsch-keyboard excellence of 'Christmas Gifts' from Foxes. This isn't because of the brilliance of the "Bontempi" sounds, but because they've managed to make a decent sound with such a basic instrument.
Finally, if you are after a high-brow moment on a sometimes-low-fi record, look no further than 'A Christmas Echo', a poem by Rebecca Willmott.
On the whole, this is actually the best Very Cherry Christmas to date.
Author: Steve
Label: Cherryade Records
Found in: Record Reviews