Twas two days before Christmas
And all through Stubby's House
Not a creature was stirring
Except for that stupid mouse
(Hey, you, get off my tail!)
My food dish is filled
With a recipe special
Nature's Variety lamb and rice
But this ain't no commercial
($1.59 for a three ounce can? Boy, did they see him coming.)
I won't eat it anyway
I must remain finicky
If you're a cat, that's what you do
It's in the job description
(I know it don't rhyme; I'm a cat, I'm not stupid)
And then there's the music
That godawful racket
It's that Christmas crap he plays
Show me a tone-arm and I'll whack it.
Right now, Stubby sleeps
I'll make mischief and fun
And--oh-oh, he's up
C'mon mouse, we gotta run!
And all through Stubby's House
Not a creature was stirring
Except for that stupid mouse
(Hey, you, get off my tail!)
My food dish is filled
With a recipe special
Nature's Variety lamb and rice
But this ain't no commercial
($1.59 for a three ounce can? Boy, did they see him coming.)
I won't eat it anyway
I must remain finicky
If you're a cat, that's what you do
It's in the job description
(I know it don't rhyme; I'm a cat, I'm not stupid)
And then there's the music
That godawful racket
It's that Christmas crap he plays
Show me a tone-arm and I'll whack it.
Right now, Stubby sleeps
I'll make mischief and fun
And--oh-oh, he's up
C'mon mouse, we gotta run!
Hey, get away from that keyboard!
Yes, it's that time of year, again. Time for my little gifty to you--"A Stubby's House Christmas 2015"--our collection of some of my favorite freebies from the 2015 holiday season (I refuse to use the word "best" for this). You know how this works. I've tagged, bundled and zipped up the collection--complete with enough artwork for you to make your own Stubby's House Christmas CD (or, in this case, two). We only use music that we wrote about in 2015 (even if some of the tracks, themselves, were from earlier) and we only use tunes that were available free, except when I've bamboozled--I mean begged--I mean convinced an artist or label to let us use a song that, otherwise, wasn't available free. Those we call Stubby's House Exclusives (Yaaaayyyyy!). And we've got a few this year. We also have some semi-exclusives, which I'll tell you about in a bit. In the track list below, exclusives are in blue while semi-exclusives are in purple. The collection goes up for download today and comes down (links removed) after Little Christmas (January 6) and will never, ever, ever be re-posted. These are mp3s, not CD audio, so, if you dig the music, please support the artists and, when applicable, purchase the tracks. "A Stubby's House Christmas 2015" is part sampler, part mix for your Christmas head, part souvenir and time-capsule of the season, and part gift (I do invest more than a little time and effort).
Yes, it's that time of year, again. Time for my little gifty to you--"A Stubby's House Christmas 2015"--our collection of some of my favorite freebies from the 2015 holiday season (I refuse to use the word "best" for this). You know how this works. I've tagged, bundled and zipped up the collection--complete with enough artwork for you to make your own Stubby's House Christmas CD (or, in this case, two). We only use music that we wrote about in 2015 (even if some of the tracks, themselves, were from earlier) and we only use tunes that were available free, except when I've bamboozled--I mean begged--I mean convinced an artist or label to let us use a song that, otherwise, wasn't available free. Those we call Stubby's House Exclusives (Yaaaayyyyy!). And we've got a few this year. We also have some semi-exclusives, which I'll tell you about in a bit. In the track list below, exclusives are in blue while semi-exclusives are in purple. The collection goes up for download today and comes down (links removed) after Little Christmas (January 6) and will never, ever, ever be re-posted. These are mp3s, not CD audio, so, if you dig the music, please support the artists and, when applicable, purchase the tracks. "A Stubby's House Christmas 2015" is part sampler, part mix for your Christmas head, part souvenir and time-capsule of the season, and part gift (I do invest more than a little time and effort).
From Fetal Records' "A Colorful Christmas" (full review here), the label has kindly granted us the use of Scott Taylor's "Homeless Christmas". This was one of my favorite records of the year and, had they tossed me a ball of lint, I'd have included it. But, no, they gave us one of the very special songs from Scott Taylor who, along with Charlie Sayles, made "A Colorful Christmas" the indispensable Christmas album I feel it to be. "Homeless Christmas" I described in our review as "street corner Soul". Behind Scott's wonderful vocals is the music of Subsidiarity (featuring some of the musicians from Fetal Records original run in the 80s). The label tells me they're thinking about recording a full album with Scott in the coming year and, if they do, we'll certainly let you know.
Our other fully exclusive track is "Auld Lang Syne" from The High 48s (our write-up of "Holidays With The High 48s" is here). This is another record I think every Christmas music collector should have. The High 48s are, essentially, a Bluegrass band, but their new Christmas album ought to appeal to plenty of people who ordinarily don't like Bluegrass--almost anyone, in fact. And those are the kinds of holiday albums you want in your collection. As it happens, "Auld Lang Syne" is one of the more Bluegrass-y tunes on "Holidays With The High 48s", but I love their version and thought it would be a perfect closer for our Stubby's House collection this year. And, no, you could not go anywhere but here and get "Auld Lang Syne" from The High 48s as a free and legal download.
We have a handful of semi-exclusives for you, as well this year. These are tracks that you possibly might have downloaded free--but only under limited circumstances. For example, we posted about "The Best Christmas Yet" from The Burnt Bridges when it was a free download. But three days later, the tune went live on iTunes and the band wrote to tell me it wasn't going to be free any more. I asked then if I could include it in our Stubby's House collection and they said they'd be honored. Cool beans! To me, it's one of the key tracks to the whole mix.
The story on Carly Thomas' "Hold You (On Christmas Eve)" (our write up is here) is similar, if different. Carly gave a free download of the track to people on her mailing list this year (which I am). She said to "share it" and, not being a complete idiot, I presumed she didn't mean to post it on a blog. So I wrote for clarification and she thought including the song in our Christmas collection was the perfect way of sharing without the song becoming perpetually free by default. You should know there are actually two versions of "Hold You (On Christmas Eve)". The longer version features about 5 seconds more of intro (and I prefer that version) but also has some kind of noisy glitch in it that I couldn't remove (you can hear it in the video). So I used the shorter version that I got from her last year. Again, I would have been a very sad Stubby if I couldn't include this beautiful song from Carly Thomas in our collection.
Our last semi-exclusive is from the one, the only, that frickin' genius mojochronic. With there being no "Santastic" volume for 2015, mojochronic's "Holiday Bling" had nowhere to go. DJBC did feature the video on his Facebook page, and mojochronic did offer a free mp3 of the Mash-Up to anyone who wanted one, but, without the "Santastic" platform, that ended up being only a handful of folks. Fear not as mojochronic is always welcome on "A Stubby's House Christmas".
Our last semi-exclusive is from the one, the only, that frickin' genius mojochronic. With there being no "Santastic" volume for 2015, mojochronic's "Holiday Bling" had nowhere to go. DJBC did feature the video on his Facebook page, and mojochronic did offer a free mp3 of the Mash-Up to anyone who wanted one, but, without the "Santastic" platform, that ended up being only a handful of folks. Fear not as mojochronic is always welcome on "A Stubby's House Christmas".
I always like to let you know who almost made the cut, but didn't, and, this year, that was Miranda Dodson. I truly, truly love the music on her free Christmas EP, "It's Merry Christmas Time", but every time I tried to place a song, it just didn't go with the tracks it was next to. I held firm until yesterday when, at last, I gave up. I won't say who got her spot, but it was a worthy tune in its own right. And, since Miranda intends to continue recording Christmas songs, I'll get another shot next year.
And one of my favorite things about the Stubby's House mix is knowing absolutely that I've included songs that no one else ever would. I can almost hear people out there saying, "No kidding. I guess he really did like that song." I think, with our two disc set for 2015, there are likely four or five such tracks. Hopefully, proper presentation will make you think again about whether those songs were worthy ones or not.
And one of my favorite things about the Stubby's House mix is knowing absolutely that I've included songs that no one else ever would. I can almost hear people out there saying, "No kidding. I guess he really did like that song." I think, with our two disc set for 2015, there are likely four or five such tracks. Hopefully, proper presentation will make you think again about whether those songs were worthy ones or not.
OK, so, again, "A Stubby's House Christmas 2015" is only available from now until Little Christmas (January 6). That gives you about two weeks to get your download on before the whole thing goes "poof" and is gone forevermore. Song titles link to our write-ups and artist names are linked up to the artist website or Facebook page (if I could find one). There are 40 Christmas tunes, here--over 2 and a half hours of holiday music especially selected to keep you entertained and help you survive the holidays. I've listened multiple times and, while it ain't my best work, it's not bad. Biggest problem, as always, is trying to get the volumes of the tracks to match up (as usual, I'm sure I failed at that, but I did try). Click [link removed] to download the Zip or on any of the Stubby's artwork. Mrs. Katz and I wish you a meowy Christmas....and to all.....a good night (hey, I haven't been to bed yet, so that works for me). Now go get it.
1. BUILDING BEAUTIFUL BUILDINGS - LORNA
2. I'LL BE THERE SOON - US THE DUO
3. THE BEST CHRISTMAS YET - THE BURNT BRIDGES (EXCLUSIVE!!)
4. CHRISTMAS BOOGIE (ONE LITTLE KISS) - JOE BONAMASSA
5. CAN'T WAIT FOR CHRISTMAS - LOOSE TAPESTRIES
6. WHATEVER YOU WANT - SPORTS
7. EVERY DAY IS CHRISTMAS - CHARLES BRADLEY
8. CHRISTMAS - THE CHURCHILL GARDEN
9. UNWRAPPING YOU - STEREOSPARKS
10. CHRISTMAS TIME - BEN MADER
11. BABY DON'T YOU CRY TOO MUCH - ICE CUTTERS
12. HO HO HO MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU - MONKEYS IN LOVE
13. HOLIDAY BLING - MOJOCHRONIC (EXCLUSIVE!!)
14. NO MEAN CHRISTMAS - PAPERBACK THRONE
15. HIPSTER HOLIDAZE - KIRABELLE FRABOTTA & BRIAN THIBAULT
16. CHRISTMASING IN PARADISE - REINDEER TRIBE
17. I SAW MOMMY KISSING SANTA CLAUS - CITRUS
18. CHRISTMAS TIME - LAUREN BIRD
19. MERRY CHRISTMAS BABY - ALEJANDRA O'LEARY
2. I'LL BE THERE SOON - US THE DUO
3. THE BEST CHRISTMAS YET - THE BURNT BRIDGES (EXCLUSIVE!!)
4. CHRISTMAS BOOGIE (ONE LITTLE KISS) - JOE BONAMASSA
5. CAN'T WAIT FOR CHRISTMAS - LOOSE TAPESTRIES
6. WHATEVER YOU WANT - SPORTS
7. EVERY DAY IS CHRISTMAS - CHARLES BRADLEY
8. CHRISTMAS - THE CHURCHILL GARDEN
9. UNWRAPPING YOU - STEREOSPARKS
10. CHRISTMAS TIME - BEN MADER
11. BABY DON'T YOU CRY TOO MUCH - ICE CUTTERS
12. HO HO HO MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU - MONKEYS IN LOVE
13. HOLIDAY BLING - MOJOCHRONIC (EXCLUSIVE!!)
14. NO MEAN CHRISTMAS - PAPERBACK THRONE
15. HIPSTER HOLIDAZE - KIRABELLE FRABOTTA & BRIAN THIBAULT
16. CHRISTMASING IN PARADISE - REINDEER TRIBE
17. I SAW MOMMY KISSING SANTA CLAUS - CITRUS
18. CHRISTMAS TIME - LAUREN BIRD
19. MERRY CHRISTMAS BABY - ALEJANDRA O'LEARY
|  | 1. ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS YOU - CHARLOTTE CARPENTER 2. HOLD YOU (ON CHRISTMAS EVE) - CARLY THOMAS (EXCLUSIVE!!) 3. LINUS & LUCY - AWJITA 4. SNAIL'S CHRISTMAS (I WANT A NEW SHELL) - THE SNAILS 5. THE GHOST OF CHRISTMAS PAST - DEIDRE & THE DARK 6. NORTHERN EXPOSURE - X-RAY PICNIC 7. HOMELESS CHRISTMAS - SCOTT TAYLOR (EXCLUSIVE!!!!) 8. IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS - KAT EATON 9. RIVER - TUMULTO 10. THAT FEELING.... - PURPLE GHERKINS 11. BOM BOM BOM - COURT YARD HOUNDS 12. ALONE ON CHRISTMAS EVE - KING CARDINAL 13. CHRISTMAS & HANUKKAH - US COMMONERS 14. WHEN THE SNOW WAS WHITER - FEATHERFIN 15. THIS IS CHRISTMAS - THE WINTER FAILURE 16. AND IT'S CHRISTMAS TIME AGAIN - DENMARK + WINTER 17. LET'S CALL A CHRISTMAS TRUCE - JOHN HARDY 18. CHRISTMAS TIME IS HERE - B3GROOVER 19. HARK! THE HERALD ANGELS SING - CLAUDIA HOYSER (Flag Girls) 20. WHO WOULD IMAGINE A KING - JEREMY KING 21. AULD LANG SYNE - THE HIGH 48s (EXCLUSIVE!!!!) |
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