Back in the Day, 2001
The Swing Cats
...Presents A Rock-A-Billy Christmas
(Cleopatra Records)
The present writer makes it a rule to avoid holiday themed rock'n'roll. (Such efforts tend to muffle vital oomph, groping instead for accessibility.) In this instance, though, an exception is eagerly made.
Players include Danny. B. Harvey, Lee Rocker, Gary Twinn, and Slim Jim Phantom. Though already objects of celebrity when arriving at this point, they strove as if hungry and delivered themselves of hot-rodded interpretations of chestnuts, whose airs and poetry are universally embraced. (Fun for the whole family, with implied flick-knife brio, one might observe.)
Shelved between standards are self-penned romps combining apt themes with Neo-Rockabilly so snapped-to-attention as to put wings on every foot in the place. And if sporadic instrumental renderings were pressed into Muzak service, there could be no guarantee the elevator car wouldn't jitter-bop straight through the roof.
First issued by Cleopatra in 2001, this has since seen reissue from various imprints, with different covers and in diverse formats.
Recommended: "Jingle Bells" (Honeydippers), "Rock, Santa, Rock" (Gary Twinn), "Jingle Bell Rock" (Swing Cats), "I'll Be Home For Christmas" (Gary Twinn), "Christmas Tree Boogie" (Swing Cats), "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" (Gary Twinn), "Hoy Hoy Hoy (Rockin' On Christmas Eve)" (Honeydippers), "My Favorite Things" (Swing Cats), "Three Kings" (Danny B. Harvey)
Videos: "Jingle Bells" "I'll Be Home for Christmas" "Christmas Tree Boogie" "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" "Three Kings"
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