https://exchange.prx.org/p/599518
It's common knowledge that not many garage bands or psychedelic rockers recorded Christmas songs, so for our annual Yuletide bash we had to stretch out a bit in both time and genre. During these two hours you will hear a sixteen minute long version of the Nutcracker Suite with lyrics, some B sides of holiday classics, a couple of short artists' sets, 3 entirely different versions of the same song, a couple of tunes that have Santa operating out of his usual element, and, to top it off, Jingle Bells like you've never heard it before!
We start the show off, however, with an old favorite...
Artist: John Lennon and Yoko Ono
Title: Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
Source: CD: Now That's What I Call Christmas (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Lennon/Ono
Label: Zomba (original label: Apple)
Year: 1971
Originally intended as an anti-Vietnam War song, John and Yoko's Happy Xmas (War Is Over) has long since acquired classic status and is now one of the most familiar songs of the season. It was first released in the US in December of 1971, but due to a problem with the publisher did not appear in the rest of the world until November of 1972.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Another Beatles Christmas Record
Source: LP: Christmas Album (originally released on flexi-disc)
Writer(s): Tony Barrow, with plenty of ad-libbing from the Beatles
Label: Apple (original label: Lyntone)
Year: 1964
Every year around Christmastime, starting in 1963, the Beatles sent out copies of a flexi-disc to members of their fan club that included a combination of skits, short bits of music and spoken messages. The 1964 edition was mostly made up of the latter, written by publicist Tony Barrow, and was only sent to the British fans of the group (US fans had to settle for an edited version of the 1963 disc). Barrow's script was apparently handwritten, as the Fab Four repeatedly stumbled over words, usually making a joke out of their mistakes. The band would continue to send out similar discs to their British fan club through 1969, although the last two (which were also sent to US fan club members) were not actually recorded as a group.
Artist: Beatles
Title: Christmas Time (Is Here Again)
Source: CD single: Free As a Bird
Writer(s): Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starkey)
Label: Apple/Capitol
Year: Recorded 1966 and 1967, released 19671997
Every year the Beatles would record a special Christmas message to go out to members of their fan club, and mail it out on what was then known as a floppy disc. This was not the same as a computer floppy disc, however. In fact, the medium the Beatles used eventually came to be known as a flexi-disc, just to keep things from getting any more confusing. Regardless of what you called it, the things tended to wear out after just a few plays and I doubt there are many playable copies of these discs left in the universe. Luckily for us, George Martin had the foresight to hang on to everything the Beatles ever recorded, including this tune, which was chopped up and used for the 1967 Christmas Greeting. When the Beatles Anthology was released in 1997, the piece was included on the Free As a Bird CD single, and we got to hear the song in its uninterrupted entirety for the first time. Included at the end are Christmas greetings from the 1966 fan club disc and a bit of poetry read by John Lennon.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: Little Saint Nick (stereo single version)
Source: CD: Beach Boys Ultimate Christmas (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Wilson/Love
Label: Capitol
Year: 1963
When the Beach Boys first recorded Little Saint Nick they were the hottest surf music band in the country. A year later Beatlemania had set in, and a new version of Little Saint Nick was recorded for the Beach Boys Christmas Album. The new version put a greater emphasis on the vocals, and much of the original instrumentation was deleted from the arrangement. That is the version that usually gets heard on commercial radio every year. In the mid-70s, Carl Wilson, who by then had stepped into the leader's role formerly held by older brother Brian, pulled out the original 1963 tapes and created a new stereo mix of the song. The instruments have greater prominence in this version and include the distinctive sound of sleighbells that were completely exorcised from the 1964 version.
Artist: Beach Boys
Title: Santa's Beard
Source: LP: The Beach Boys' Christmas Album
Writer(s): Wilson/Love
Label: Capitol/EMI
Year: 1964
Here's a little known fact. Brian Wilson played piano on a song for the 1963 LP A Christmas Gift For You From Philles Records, but was dismissed by producer Phil Spector for his "substandard" piano playing. But Wilson got even with Spector in a big way the following year by producing The Beach Boys' Christmas Album, which continued to chart year after year at Christmastime, long after Spector's album had gone out of print. The Beach Boys' Christmas Album was made up of several traditional holiday songs sung by members of the group with orchestral accompaniment, along with five original tunes performed by the band itself. Among those five was Santa's Beard, a song originally credited solely to Wilson, but as of 1994 now credits Mike Love as a co-writer. I can't help but wonder if Santa's Beard is based on a true story; if so, my money's on Dennis as the "little brother" who pulled the beard off the department store Santa.
Artist: Charles Brown
Title: Please Come Home For Christmas
Source: CD: Billboard Greatest Christmas Hits 1955-Present (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Brown/Redd
Label: Rhino (original label: King)
Year: 1960
By now just about everyone is familiar with the Eagles version of Please Come Home For Christmas. Not everyone, however, knows the song was written by blues great Charles Brown. Even fewer have actually heard Brown's 1960 original, which is a shame, as it blows the Eagles version clean out of the water.
Artist: Amos Milburn
Title: Christmas (Comes But Once A Year)
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Milburn/Shubert
Label: King
Year: 1960
It's debatable whether this one should be considered a B side or half of a double A side. It appeared in 1960 as the other side of Charles Brown's original version of Please Come Home For Christmas. Two classics for the price of one!
Artist: Bobby Helms
Title: Captain Santa Claus (And His Reindeer Space Patrol)
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Reid/Altman
Label: Decca
Year: 1957
UFOs were a big deal in the 1950s, and the entertainment industry took advantage of it in a big way. One of the odder entries was Captain Santa Claus (And His Reindeer Space Patrol) the B side of Bobby Helms's classic Jingle Bell Rock. For obvious reasons, this one doesn't get played on your local Christmas Music station.
Artist: Brenda Lee
Title: Papa Noel
Source: CD: Cool Yule (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Ray Botkin
Label: Rhino
Year: 1958
Just about everyone is familiar with Brenda Lee's 1958 hit Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree. Not as well known is the flip side of that single, a song called Papa Noel. Lee, known as "Little Miss Dynamite" was first discovered by country legend Red Foley when still in her teens.
Artist: Jose Ferrer
Title: Yes Virginia, There Is A Santa Claus
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Barrett/Baker
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1960
Jose Ferrer was one of the most respected film and Broadway stars of the 1950s, appearing in starring roles in Cyrano de Bergerac, The Caine Mutiny and Moulin Rouge on film and both directing and starring in several successful Broadway productions. For the 1960 Christmas season he recorded this abridged version of Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Claus, originally published as a newspaper editorial in 1897 by Francis Pharcellus Church. Ferrer's reading is supplemented by singing from "The Ferrers", a group of children that presumably included five-year-old Miguel Ferrer, the oldest of his five children with actress Rosemary Clooney.
Artist: Drifters
Title: White Christmas
Source: Mono CD: Billboard Greatest Christmas Hits 1955-Present (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Irving Berlin
Label: Rhino (original label: Atlantic)
Year: 1955
The Drifters were a kind of early R&B doowop supergroup made up of ex-members of other R&B groups such as Billy Ward's Dominoes. The most distinctive voice of the original Drifters was high tenor Clyde McPhatter (for whom Ray Stevens's famous camel was named), which is heard prominently on their version of Irving Berlin's White Christmas. Over the years the group's lineup changed many times and led to several former members forming competing groups, all using the Drifters name. Over time, members of these offshoots would in turn form their own Drifters, despite having virtually no connection to the original group. This is why it sometimes seems that half the doowop singers in the world claim to be former members of the Drifters.
Artist: Marquees
Title: Christmas In the Congo
Source: Mono CD: Cool Yule (Originally released as 45 RPM single, possibly promo only)
Writer(s): Masten/Botkin
Label: Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1959
I recently saw a signed publicity photo of the Marquees taken sometime in the late 1950s. One of the signatures is Marvin Gaye's. What I have not been able to find is any evidence that this record was actually released commercially, although at least one promo copy is known to exist.
Artist: Jimmy McCracklin
Title: Christmas Time
Source: Mono CD: Blue Yule (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Jimmy McCracklin
Label: Rhino (original label: Art-Tone)
Year: 1961
Jimmy McCracklin recorded one of the catchiest, yet underplayed, tunes of the 50s when he did The Walk. Christmas Time, from a few years later, actually sounds to me like Carolina beach music. Go figure.
Artist: Solomon Burke
Title: Presents For Christmas
Source: CD: Cool Yule (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Burke/Burke/Burke
Label: Rhino (original label: Atlantic)
Year: 1966
Solomon Burke was a staple artist for the Atlantic label at a time when Atlantic itself was being overshadowed by the Stax/Volt labels that it distributed. Nonetheless, Burke had several R&B hits throughout the sixties and was highly respected by his fellow artists. Presents For Christmas captures Burke at his peak in 1966.
Artist: James Brown
Title: Santa Claus, Santa Claus
Source: CD: Cool Yule (originally released on LP: Soulful Christmas)
Writer(s): Bobbitt/Jones
Label: Rhino (original label: King)
Year: 1968
Few people would ever accuse James Brown of being a blues artist, but this recording of Santa Claus, Santa Claus (sometimes called just Santa Claus) from 1968 shows what it would have sounded like if he was.
Artist: Clarence Carter
Title: Back Door Santa
Source: CD: Christmas A Go-Go (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Carter/Daniel
Label: Wicked Cool (original label: Atlantic)
Year: 1969
Clarence Carter is an icon of the beach music (for you non-Carolinians, beach music has nothing to do with surf music) crowd. For everyone else, he is a moderately successful soul artist known mostly for his mid-70s hit Slip Away. Regardless of where you might know him from, his Back Door Santa will surprise you with its down and funky energy.
Artist: Rufus Thomas
Title: I'll Be Your Santa Baby
Source: Mono CD: Christmas A Go-Go (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer: Thomas/Roberts
Label: Wicked Cool (original label: Stax)
Year: 1973
Rufus Thomas had a long and storied career going back to the 1950s, first with Bear Cat, an answer song to Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller's Hound Dog, and later with his own series of "dog" hits (Walking the Dog being the most famous). By the mid-1960s he was an important member of the Stax/Volt stable of artists, where his daughter Carla was making a name for herself with hits like B-A-B-Y and (with Otis Redding) Tramp. After Stax severed its distribution deal with Atlantic Records Rufus Thomas stayed with the now fully independent Stax, releasing I'll Be Your Santa Baby in 1973.
Artist: Ray Stevens
Title: Santa Claus Is Watching You
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer: Ray Stevens
Label: Mercury
Year: 1962
I've mentioned something called the Grab Bag before. Basically, it was a sealed paper bag (sometimes with a clear plastic front) containing four 45 RPM records, generally "cut-outs" that were no longer in print. The one my family bought for Christmas of 1964 had a Sing Along With Mitch Christmas EP in the front. By far the oddest record in the bag was Santa Claus Is Watching You by Ray Stevens, although I seem to remember that version being slightly different than the one heard here. One thing that both versions had in common was the presence of Clyde the Camel from Stevens's first hit, Ahab the Arab.
Artist: Ed "Cookie" Byrnes
Title: Yulesville
Source: CD: Cool Yule (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): Galanoy/Olafson/Barker
Label: Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1959
The ABC TV network was a perennial also-ran that was just starting to find a winning formula in the late 50s with shows targeted toward a younger audience. The most popular of these was 77 Sunset Strip, starring Ed "Cookie" Byrnes. He and co-star Connie Stevens, staying in character, cut a hit novelty record called Cookie, Cookie, which played on Cookie's propensity for combing his hair. Byrnes, again in character, followed it up with this hip retelling of the classic poem Twas the Night Before Christmas.
Artist: Cadillacs
Title: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer: Johnny Marks
Label: Josie
Year: 1956
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer has been recorded by a lot of different artists over the years, but this version by the Cadillacs stands out for its pure sense of fun. Doo-wop was at the peak of its popularity in 1956 and the Cadillacs, led by Earl "Speedoo" Carroll, were among the best of the bunch. New Jersey rock band The Smithereens would use this arrangement for their 1992 CD single distributed exclusively to radio stations.
Artist: King Curtis
Title: The Christmas Song
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Mel Torme
Label: Atco
Year: 1966
King Curtis was one of the most in-demand saxophone players of the first wave of rock and roll. His best known work was on the song Yakety Yak by the Coasters in 1958. In the sixties he became the music director for the Atlantic Records group, appearing on a variety of recordings by artists such as Solomon Burke and occassionally releasing material on the Atco label under his own name. Tragically, his life was cut short when he was the victim of a stabbing when he attempted to stop junkies from shooting up on his front steps in New York.
Artist: Royal Guardsmen
Title: Snoopy's Christmas
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Hugo & Luigi/Weiss
Label: Laurie
Year: 1967
Like many American bands, the Ocala, Florida based Posmen decided to change their name to something more Anglo sounding in the wake of the British invasion of 1964. As the Royal Guardsmen they had their first regional hit in 1966 with a song called Baby Let's Wait. It was their next release, however, that established the direction the group's career would take from that point on. Snoopy vs. the Red Baron was a huge national hit, going all the way to the #2 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 in late 1966. Several more Snoopy themed songs followed, including Snoopy's Christmas, released in 1967. The most recent of these is Snoopy vs. Osama, which came out in 2006.
Artist: Spike Jones And His City Slickers
Title: The Nutcracker Suite
Source: 45 RPM Extended Play
Writer(s): Tchaikovsky/Washburne/Carling
Label: RCA Victor
Year: 1945 (EP release year 1952)
In 1945 virtually all recordings were made on phonograph records made from a shellac compound and rotated at 78 revolutions per minute. The most common of these were 7" in diameter and could only accomodate about three minutes' worth of sound per side. Some classical recordings used records with a 12" diameter, and could hold around five minutes of music per side, but they were generally targeted toward wealthier record buyers. Spike Jones And His City Slickers had already established themselves as masters of the parody song with hit singles such as Der Fuerhrer's Face and Cocktails For Two during World War II, and in 1945 decided to take on a much bigger project: their own unique take on Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite, with lyrics by Foster Carling and additional music by Country Washburn. The entire work ran nearly 16 minutes in length and was spread out over three 7" 78 RPM records. The cover of this album (as multiple record sets were known) proclaimed "Spike Jones presents for the Kiddies The Nutcracker Suite" with the added line "with apologies to Tchaikovsky " scrawled across the bottom of the cover. The album proved popular enough to be among the first 45 RPM box sets released in 1949 and was released yet again as a single 45RPM Extended Play record in 1952. With a running time of nearly eight minutes per side, this remains one of the lengthiest 45s ever released.
Artist: Chuck Berry
Title: Merry Christmas, Baby
Source: Mono CD: The Chess Box (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer: Baxter/Moore
Label: Chess/MCA
Year: 1958
Chuck Berry did not record too many cover tunes, as he was a prolific songwriter himself. However, for his 1958 Christmas single he cut this tasty version of Charles Brown's "other" Christmas song, Merry Christmas, Baby, originally recorded by Johnny Moore's Three Blazers (with Brown on lead vocal). The B side of Berry's single, Run Rudolph Run, was also a cover song, although the tune has come to be almost exclusively associated with Berry himself.
Artist: Otis Redding
Title: Merry Christmas Baby
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Baxter/Moore
Label: Atco
Year: 1968
Merry Christmas Baby was originally released by Johnny Moore's Three Blazers, which featured Charles Brown on guitar and vocals, in 1947. Several different versions of the song have been recorded over the years by such diverse artists as Chuck Berry, Ike & Tina Turner, Hansen, Christina Aguilara, Bruce Springsteen and Brown himself. Otis Redding's version of the song was released in 1968, almost a year after the plane crash that killed the singer and most of his band.
Artist: Ike And Tina Turner
Title: Merry Christmas Baby
Source: CD: Cool Yule (originally released as 45 RPM single B side)
Writer(s): Baxter/Moore
Label: Rhino (original label: Warner Brothers)
Year: 1964
Ike Turner was a talent scout for Chess Records that formed a band called the Kings Of Rhythm in the early 50s, immediately scoring a #1 R&B hit backing Jackie Brenston on a song called Rocket 88. By 1964 he had married Anna Mae Bullock, who changed her name to Tina Turner and began receiving co-billing on Ike's records, such as the 1964 B side, Merry Christmas Baby. Although technically the same as the Charles Brown song of the same name, the track is musically worlds away from Brown's slow blues number.
Artist: Fred Waring And His Pennsylvanians
Title: Jingle Bells
Source: 45 RPM Extended Play: Christmas Songs With Fred Waring And His Pennsylvanians (originally released as 45 RPM single)
Writer(s): James Lord Pierpont
Label: Decca
Year: 1950, EP released 1959
In 1970 the Beatles released a tune called You Know My Name (Look Up The Number) as the B side of Let It Be. The piece, played somewhat for humor, was a John Lennon creation that had been sitting on the shelf for a couple years. It presented a simple, one verse tune several times, each time in a completely different style. Lennon did something similar for the verses of the song I Want You (She's So Heavy) on the Abbey Road album. Knowing how Lennon often drew inspiration from records he had heard growing up I have to wonder if the original 1950 version of this record, spread out over two sides and running a total of seven minutes, may have been one of them. Like the aforementioned Beatles tracks, Fred Waring's Pennsylvanians take a simple tune, Jingle Bells, and present it multiple times in totally different styles. Definitely a fun ride!
Artist: Greg Lake
Title: Humbug
Source: Stereo British import 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Lake/Sinfield
Label: Manticore
Year: 1975
For the B side of I Believe In Father Christmas, Greg Lake and lyricist Peter Sinfield came up with a rather silly semi-instrumental track called Humbug. I hope Sinfield didn't get paid by the word on this one.
Artist: Ventures
Title: Scrooge
Source: LP: The Ventures Christmas Album
Writer: Wilson/Taylor/Edwards/Bogle
Label: Dolton
Year: 1965
The classic lineup of the Ventures, Don Wilson (rhythm guitar), Bob Bogle (bass), Nokie Edwards (lead guitar), and Mel Taylor (drums), were best known for interpreting existing songs such as Walk Don't Run and Hawaii Five-O rather than writing them themselves. They did manage to sneak in an original composition or two on each of the albums, however, including Scrooge, from their 1965 Christmas album.
Artist: Ventures
Title: Sleigh Ride
Source: LP: The Ventures Christmas Album
Writer: Leroy Anderson
Label: Dolton
Year: 1965
The Ventures are by far the most successful instrumental rock group in history, with over 100 albums released over several decades. One of the most successful of these was their 1965 Christmas album, which featured this surfinated version of Leroy Anderson's Sleigh Ride, a piece usually associated with the Boston Pops Orchestra.
Artist: Johnny And The Hurricanes
Title: Molly-O
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): King/Mack
Label: Big Top
Year: 1960
Similar in style to the Ventures, Johnny And The Hurricanes, from Toledo, Ohio, specialized in doing modernized versions of old standards such as Red River Valley (which they retitled Red River Rock), Down Yonder (with Way and In New Orleans dropped from the title) and You Are My Sunshine. In fact, it was the B side of the latter that caught my attention, because, in spite of the fact that it's officially credited to "King/Mack" (actually Harry Balk and Irving Micahnik, the band's managers), Molly-O is a rocked out version of none other than the traditional English folk tune Greensleeves. Since that tune was also used for the Christmas song What Child Is This, I decided it deserved a spot on the Yule show.
Artist: Gene Autry
Title: Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Johnny Marks
Label: Columbia
Year: 1949
Throughout the Great Depression the Chicago-based department store chain Montgomery Ward had been buying and giving away booklets for Christmas, but in 1939 they decided to save money by producing one of their own. They assigned advertising copywriter Robert L May to write a "cheery children's book", suggesting he come up with something similar to Walt Disney's Ferdinand the Bull. After a trip to the zoo with his four-year-old daughter May decided to make his main character a reindeer with a nose bright enough to cut through the Chicago fog. At first his bosses rejected the story (written in the same poetic style as A Visit From Saint Nick) due to the general perception of a red nose being an indication of inebriation, but after getting a co-worker to come up with drawings of "cute reindeer" (based on actual deer in the Chicago Zoo rather than reindeer in Norway), management relented, and the booklet was published in time for Christmas. It was an instant hit, and ten years later May's brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, turned May's poem into a song, publishing it in May of 1939. Less than two months later, at his wife's insistence, Gene Autry recorded the song, releasing it in September of 1949. It went on to become the number one song that Christmas, and has since gone on to sell (including various cover versions) over 150 million copies, a number exceeded only by White Christmas.
Artist: Gene Autry
Title: Santa's Comin' In A Whirlybird
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Ashley Dees
Label: Republic
Year: 1959
Gene Autry was literally a five star performer, and is the only person to have stars on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame in all five categories: film, radio, television, music and live performance. He started performing while still in high school in southern Oklahoma and managed to get himself fired from a job as an overnight telegraph operator for singing and playing guitar while on duty. One of the customers, a guy named Will Rogers, heard him singing one night and told him he ought to try going pro. He did, and at age 21 was billed as "Oklahoma's Yodeling Cowboy" on a Tulsa radio station. This led to a contract with Columbia Records and a four-year stint on Chicago station WLS's National Barn Dance. He made his first film as The Singing Cowboy in 1934; he would appear in 92 more, and in the early 1950s had his own television show. Many of these films were for Republic Pictures. He continued to make records through the end of the 1950s, with no less than three of his hits, Here Comes Santa Claus, Frosty The Snowman and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, becoming Christmas standards. His last new single was Santa's Comin' In A Whirlybird, released on Republic's own record label in 1959. In the 1960s Autry became known for his business interests, including L.A.'s powerhouse independent TV station KTLA and the Los Angeles Angels baseball team. He also served as vice-president of baseball's American League from 1983 until his death in 1997.
Artist: Buchanan And Goodman with Paul Sherman
Title: Santa And The Satellite-parts one and two (including an excerpt from Stan Freberg's Green Christmas)
Source: 45 RPM single
Writer(s): Buchanan/Goodman
Label: Luniverse
Year: 1957
In 1956 musician/record producer Dickie Goodman, in partnership with songwriter Bill Buchanan, created what came to be known as the "break-in" by interspersing short snippets of hit songs with dialogue for comedic effect. Buchanan and Goodman's first hit was The Flying Saucer, which capitalized on the UFO craze of the mid-1950s and went to the #3 spot on the national charts. For the next couple of years the pair continued to create new collages, the most successful of which was Santa And The Satellite, released in November of 1957. Unfortunately, lawsuits brought by the copyright holders of some of the songs they sampled ate up all their profits, and Buchanan and Goodman went their separate ways in 1959. Since Santa And The Satellite is actually spread out over two sides of the same record, I used the Tyn-E-Tim™ Chestnuts commercial from Stan Freberg's 1956 Green Christmas single to fill in while I turned the record over.
Artist: King Curtis
Title: What Are You Doing New Year's Eve
Source: 45 RPM single B side
Writer(s): Frank Loesser
Label: Atco
Year: 1968
King Curtis (born Curtis Ousley) was a saxophonist who could play jazz, R&B and rock 'n' roll equally well, and was considered a master of the tenor, alto and soprano saxophone. His playing was heard on dozens of recordings in the 50s and 60s, including the Coasters' Yakety Yak, Aretha Frankin's Respect and his own Memphis Soul Stew. After signing with Atlantic in the mid-1960s, Curtis's singles consisted mainly of instrumental versions of hit songs such as Ode To Billie Joe and A Whiter Shade Of Pale. In 1968 he released his own version of The Christmas Song, backed with What Are You Doing New Year's Eve.