Category: Electronica

LAST SUMMER - WINTER'S EVE

12/15/2018

I've been looking for something like this...some mellow Electronica with Beats. There's something very Christmasy about mellow Electronica with Beats. I don't know why, exactly, but why ask why?

"Winter's Eve" is an EP from Los Angeles based Last Summer. The title track is gorgeous and dreamy, but too damn short for my head. Run that sucker for 4 minutes, please. "Frozen Meadow" is even shorter. But "Warm By The Fire With You", as Goldilocks might say, is just right. It's got the right tempo, the right Christmas feel, and it runs a good 3 minutes and 22 seconds. So thank you, Last Summer, I feel much better now. Ahhhhhhhh....

The "Winter's Eve" EP from Last Summer is name-your-price at Bandcamp.

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VARIOUS - THE CHVRCH OF SANTA

12/11/2018

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Late in every season, all these great free comps come out and I almost never have time to listen to them all the way through. Well I listened to "The Chvrch of Santa" all the way through. It's the latest in a long line of annual Christmas offerings from Friends Friends Friends Records. The Nova Scotia "label" evolved from the Raw Rock Militia. That's why "The Chvrch of Santa" is only Friends Friends Friends IV, even though there are Christmas comps dating back to 2010. These days, the Raw Rock Christmas project works like this: early in November, they send out a call to anybody and everybody to send in their Christmas tunes. A month later, they've got an album. It's worth noting that, most years, a limited edition CD will follow (given the turnaround time and all, the CDs usually get listed a few days before Christmas).

1.   Whisperhawk - Merry Christmas (I'm Sorry)
2.   Rawrwar - Christmas Miracle
3.   The Holly Jollies - Daddy's Really Santa Claus
4.   Up n Adam - Snowglobe Inverted
5.   Blue Acres - If We Make It Through December
6.   Alex Babineau - First Christmas Alone
7.   Brett Redshaw - Christmas Is The Best
8.   Rawrwar - Cuba
9.   Nicholas Burgess - Santa Planet
10. The Super-Krewe - Xmas Potpourri
11. Katie King - Gingerbread Man
12. Alex Babineau - Santa Looked A Lot Like Daddy
13. Jeremy Waterman - Father Christmas
14. Sprout - What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?

DOWNLOAD FROM BANDCAMP

Although I listened all the way through, I'm not going to do a track-by-track. But this year's set is a good one. There's our old friend Nicholas Burgess with "Santa Planet". And I'm always happy to see Katie King on these; I love her stuff. The Holly Jollies go all Neo-Beach Boys on "Daddy's Really Santa Claus". There's an acoustic "Father's Christmas" from Jeremy Waterman, a straight-up Folk cover of "If We Make It Through December" by Blue Acres, some very nearly Punk Country from Alex Babineau covering Buck Owens, and even some Second Line Jazz from The Super-Krewe, "Xmas Potpourri". But beyond Nicholas and Katie, my favorites were the two tracks from Rawrwar and the Indie Pop tune up top, Whisperhawk's "Merry Christmas (I'm Sorry)". Importantly, there wasn't a single track where I was even tempted to pick up the virtual needle and move on. Great work, as usual, Friends Friends Friends. Find "The Chvrch of Santa" on Bandcamp.

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ERIC C. POWELL (feat. ANDREA POWELL) - O COME EMMANUEL

11/26/2018

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Ancient carols done up in Synth Pop style? Count me in. Eric C. Powell is no newcomer to Synth Pop, having led the 90s band Turning Key, who opened for such acts as Flock of Seagulls, Missing Persons and Depeche Mode. Now living in Austin, Texas (where, it turns out, there's a thriving synthwave community) Eric is turning out solo albums like "Back To Life". His new Christmas single "O Come Emmanuel" featuring wife Andrea Powell, is currently a name-your-price download at Bandcamp, as is the 1987 (pre-Turning Key) demo recording of "A Wonderful Christmas". (To get the songs for free, click on "buy track" for each song.)

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RUNNING VERTICAL - THE UNOFFICIAL HOLIDAY EP

7/19/2017

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Note: Like every other online service, terms change over time. When I came to Weebly, it was free and pages were unlimited. Well, now, there's a limit, apparently, and I'm over mine. So I can't add a new Free Page. But I can keep this one going, it seems, so that's what I'm gonna do. Honestly, I don't imagine I'll be adding anything new next year. Not sure why I'm doing it this year. But we'll see if we can't beat the house just one more time. The internal links still seem to work, but you might have to update your links, if you've linked to a track from outside the site (as 2016 has become 2017, see).

I can't speak for anyone else, but I very much dug the original Mannheim Steamroller album. It was fresh and different. But they, pretty soon, settled into a little pocket and too much of their later work sounded, to me, like everything else they'd done. I never got the feeling they were trying anything new. That's just me, of course, but its my honest feeling. They got to sounding too orchestral without the edge that first album had.

So Running Vertical's 3 song EP, "The Unofficial Holiday EP" took me back to that first Mannheim Steamroller record. It's pure Electronica that restores that edge.

Running Vertical is Amren Murray of Lincoln, Nebraska. "The Unofficial Holiday EP" is three tracks of solid seasonal sentiment that you can dance to. "Canon In D" may appeal to the Ambient Crowd. "Good King Wenceslas", a tribute to Mannheim Steamroller in its way, has a bit of that Kraftwerk "Autobahn" feel to it. And "The Halls" was my favorite. It's borderline EDM (a lot of which I can't stand), but the melody beneath the beat is gorgeous and it actually goes somewhere...like a horse drawn sleigh racing across snow covered hills. It would work nicely on the dance floor (mentally, I segued into JLo's "Waiting For Tonight"), but it's an enjoyable listen even if you aren't dancing.

I'm not sure why anyone would release a Christmas record in March, but its name-your-price, so you can stash it away for later, if you like. You'll find "The Unofficial Holiday EP" at Bandcamp.

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The FREE List

Here we hope to direct you to some of the Christmas music on the web that can be yours absolutely free. We will not direct you to mp3 or sharity sites, here, but only to artist sites, label sites, and other authorized and unquestionably legal locations.

LAST SUMMER - WINTER'S EVE

VARIOUS - THE CHVRCH OF SANTA

ERIC C. POWELL (feat. ANDREA POWELL) - O COME EMMANUEL

RUNNING VERTICAL - THE UNOFFICIAL HOLIDAY EP

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