Friday, December 19, 2008

FDF Volume 2 Issue 121 A Classic Cartoon Christmas, Too



Album - A Classic Cartoon Christmas, Too
Artist - Various
Key Players - Various
Produced By - Juli Davidson, Ted Green and Rich Cronin



Release Date - October 14, 1997


What caused me to blow off the dust? - It is Christmas time, plus last year we looked at Volume One and it was a pretty big hit with readers.


Overview
- A second collection of tunes from the claymation, stop motion Christmas specials that always seemed to air the day after Thanksgiving. Now with DVD copies of said specials, you never can be too far out of reach of one.


FDF Comments (aka the songs)
- broken down by Song and the special it came from.

The collection opens up with the one/two punch of "Heat Miser" and "Snow Miser" both from "Year Without a Santa Claus". Both tracks you'd expect to appear on a Volume one, but they must have done this on purpose. Unload the big guns right at the outset. "We Wish You A Hairy Chestwig" is culled from "The Ren & Stimpy Show Crock O' Christmas". The cartoon cat and dog combo offer up some laughs, more on the spoken word portions leading up the song (sung to the tune of We Wish You A Merry Christmas). Going back to the formula of the first two songs we get a "double shot" from the special "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" when The First Toymaker to the King and "No More Toymakers To the King". The musical formula is identical (good time saver) just change the lyrics some. A classic Burl Ives lead "Silver and Gold" from "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" may sound a little unfamiliar, but you are quickly calmed when his smooth voice hits your hears. A sort of odd sounding "There's Always Tomorrow" from "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" is included. Sung by a solo female voice (not credited in full on the compilation) doesn't really feel "Christmasy" and you sort of start to wonder if the producers struggled to put the finishing touches on the compilation. Its not a bad song, but seems a smidge out of place. The track "Holidays" comes from "Madeline's Favorite Songs". It is sung by some young sounding people with french accents. A track I had personally never heard before this collection is "Follow that Star" from The Beginner's Bible Sings". It is a very Christian rock song. Its not horrible, but it is just not my bag at all. The collection wraps up with "The Lord's Blessing" that comes from the darkhorse holiday special "Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol". Knowing the story of a down trodden family at Christmas time comes to life with a happy uptempo song about a family realizing they have the true meaning of the holidays, and that just being together is a gift enough.


FDF Overall Take - A pretty strong Christmas collection. Someone will have the smarts to put this (and volume one) out once more. These songs, although campy, usually where most people find their favorite versions.

Curious? Check out some MUSIC!

mp3's have been taken down

Silver and Gold
The First Toy Maker To The King
Heat Miser

It is out of print but if you feel like dropping the dough you can find it here

Disclaimer - For the most part songs listed you can find on iTunes or your local cd shop. The idea is to give you a little taste of the music. Please support the artist buy purchasing some of their work. Songs are posted for about 1 week but can and will be removed at the request of the artist, band, band management etc. If you are one of those persons contact me via the email link in the profile and they will be removed as soon as we are made aware of the request.

1 Comments:

At 11:25 AM, Blogger Ello - Ellen Oh said...

I adore Heat miser and snow miser! I never even heard of this album! I'm going to have to buy it! Thanks to you!

 

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