Advent reviews 19th:

"Christmas" by Johnny Reid

Emma: ***.5
Charlie: ****

Emma: I'll be honest, the album cover here did not inspire confidence. I'd never heard of this chap and was putting off listening to this one until it was the last thing in the cottage. Looks like: Over-produced smarm-jazz. But: It isn't! It's pretty darn good country/honky-tonk. What?! Who hired that photographer?

Charlie: To look at the cover, you'd never imagine what this sounds like. So first recommendation: Johnny, fire whoever talked you into using that picture for the cover art. In all the liner note pictures, he looks the way he sounds: Pleasingly rough, energetic, country/rock with a good dose of retro. We'd have been more likely to listen to this record if it weren't for the weirdly plastic, genreless cover photo. Was it a jazz album? Crooner? R&B? Country would have been my last guess.
But enough about the cover: the album was a wonderful surprise— solid arrangements, a great voice and good performance, no spoken-word track (!) and takes on some traditional tunes that outdo the 'standard' rendition: His "Blue Christmas" is leagues better than Elvis', and his "Little Drummer Boy" is possibly the best recording I've heard of that song— usually it makes me want to claw my ears off. Probably the first track, "Silent Night", is the strongest, but the entire album is definitely a must-listen.

Does one want it: If one is Charlie, then yes.