And Bieber's not stopping with just the one runaway single. The album won't be out until November 1, but the Bieb-meister is already releasing a second single from the set. As of Monday, Justin's chestnut roasting duet with Usher on Mel Torme's "The Christmas Song" is available at the iTunes digital store.
August Burns Red will be releasing a limited edition 7" on November 8. The "A" side is the band's previously unreleased take on "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" while the "B" side will feature last year's digital single "Little Drummer Boy". The total run is limited to 1000, with 400 copies coming on gold vinyl, 400 on white vinyl and 200 featuring a mix of gold and white vinyl. Pre-orders are being taken via the Ci Records web store.
50 years on and Billy Burnette has finally recorded another Christmas song. "Rock And Roll In Christmas" hit Amazon and iTunes on October 11 and it's a fairly respectable retro Rockabilly rave-up. It's actually a Christmas take on the title cut from Billy's latest album, "Rock N Roll With It", but it's not as though he's the first person ever to adapt one of their songs to the season. If you somehow missed out on those Billy Beau holiday sounds from 1961, Billy's unofficial fan site is nice enough to offer them up as free downloads. You'll find "Hey Daddy" and "Santa's Coffee" in the lyrics section.
Presented with a 3 week tour break, Nicole Kehl did what any one with a dream and a lick of sense would do. She hit the studio and recorded a bunch of Christmas songs. "For as long as I can remember, I've wanted to make my own Holiday record. Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday and I'm obsessed with the season's music." Sounds like my kind of woman! Don't know when or if we'll be hearing the rest of the Christmas music Nicole cut--a digital album is certainly possible at some point--but the Christmas single has been released. "Christmas Crush" is a superfine soulful slice. Truthfully, I really like it and I hope we get to hear more from Nicole Kehl real soon. Download "Christmas Crush" through iTunes and Amazon MP3.
Ricky Fitzpatrick is getting set to release his second Christmas album. Fitzpatrick is a Christian folk artist whose sound seems very much in the James Taylor mold. Last year's Christmas set, "Acoustically Christmas", was very nice indeed and, this fall, Ricky will follow up with "Apple Valley Christmas" (pre-orders available at Ricky's web site). "Jingle Bell Blues" was originally intended as a bonus track on the CD, but Ricky liked it so much, he made it the lead single. We liked it too. It's a Country Blues tune you can easily imagine showing up on many a Country Christmas album in the years to come. You can download "Jingle Bell Blues" at CD Baby or Amazon MP3.