Where does Chilly Gonzalez get off?
No, wait, better question to start with—who is Chilly Gonzalez? It's not like I was obligated to know a particular artist before I slapped their name on the fucking holiday album poll. And the Wikipedia article about him is all over the place, which seems to me like the mark of an artist who is himself all over the place. He's released classical music. He's released rap music. He has a Grammy for collaborating on a few songs on the Album of the Year winner Random Access Memories. He has a Christmas album, apparently.
So this answers the first question—Chilly Gonzalez "gets off" by doing whatever the fuck he wants. I respect it. I don't know if I necessarily like it, or need to like it, but I respect it. Anyone who can play "All I Want for Christmas Is You" without making me put a gun to my temple is gonna earn my respect. That overplayed dreck, and other pop Christmas standards like "Last Christmas," are given the somber piano treatment here. Strip that shit down to its studs and see if it still ticks. I don't think it's necessarily enjoyable to hear Chilly Gonzalez play the piano instead of hear George Michael's silky vocals, but at least it's something different. We value "different" here during the Christmas season, when everyone else seems to crave "the same," every year.
A couple famous faces show up to help with the vocals (which are otherwise few and far between). Feist is on a couple tracks to do her thing. Jarvis Cocker of Pulp joins Feist on one of those songs, a cover of the not-even-two-years-old-at-the-time David Berman track "Snow Is Falling in Manhattan," which probably took on some extra weight when performed via telecast from an empty Paris theater in 2020 (this being our first COVID Christmas), since David Berman had just committed suicide the year prior.
So, this means, I guess, that Chilly Gonzalez values the sadness and melancholy of Christmas? That's the only explanation I can think of after listening to somber piano ballads for 40 minutes or so from some random fucking guy. Yes, there is plenty of room for sadness during this time of year. But let's not linger on it.
So this answers the first question—Chilly Gonzalez "gets off" by doing whatever the fuck he wants. I respect it. I don't know if I necessarily like it, or need to like it, but I respect it. Anyone who can play "All I Want for Christmas Is You" without making me put a gun to my temple is gonna earn my respect. That overplayed dreck, and other pop Christmas standards like "Last Christmas," are given the somber piano treatment here. Strip that shit down to its studs and see if it still ticks. I don't think it's necessarily enjoyable to hear Chilly Gonzalez play the piano instead of hear George Michael's silky vocals, but at least it's something different. We value "different" here during the Christmas season, when everyone else seems to crave "the same," every year.
A couple famous faces show up to help with the vocals (which are otherwise few and far between). Feist is on a couple tracks to do her thing. Jarvis Cocker of Pulp joins Feist on one of those songs, a cover of the not-even-two-years-old-at-the-time David Berman track "Snow Is Falling in Manhattan," which probably took on some extra weight when performed via telecast from an empty Paris theater in 2020 (this being our first COVID Christmas), since David Berman had just committed suicide the year prior.
So, this means, I guess, that Chilly Gonzalez values the sadness and melancholy of Christmas? That's the only explanation I can think of after listening to somber piano ballads for 40 minutes or so from some random fucking guy. Yes, there is plenty of room for sadness during this time of year. But let's not linger on it.
GRADE: 2.5 pukes out of 5
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