New Stuff

"New stuff" is a relative term for me. I loaded Christmas songs in to my MP3 player last night to take into work today and I had 185 new songs since I last loaded songs in there a few days ago. So when I say "new stuff" I mean the picks of the newest of the new....just stuff I got today. I think there might be one track I am sharing today that I got yesterday, though. It's always a daunting task to pick files out of so many to share, but we will get to them, one MP3 at a time!

First up is a new song by a familiar band. I've been checking their My Space page almost daily for the last couple weeks waiting for a new Christmas song. It's Camera Obscura, and while we've had a handful of Belle and Sebastian Christmas songs to share online for a couple years now, I never knew about any Camera Obscura songs. Either this is brand new, or I just missed it in my searches last year. Either way, it's a winner in my book because it holds true to what I always recommend artists to do: if you can't come up with a good original Christmas Song, cover a more obscure track and make it a GOOD cover version.

They give us a version of "Little Donkey," and I can probably count on one hand how many versions I have in my collection personally. It's not exactly Frosty the Snowman. But it's a fun little tune, and I just dig their take on it.

Camera Obscura-Little Donkey

Next up is The Birthday Girl Vs AFH, and this comes from a 2006 collection called "Filthy Little Angels." It's called "Hey Santa," but it is not a cover version of the painfully bad song most of us might be familiar with by the same name. It seems to be an original, and a refreshing one at that.

The Birthday Girl Vs AFH-Hey Santa

I found an online only single by Komon, who is from Göteborg, Västra Götalands län Sweden. This could also fall into the same category as my post from a few days ago of new artists I discover solely through their work in Christmas music. I don't know about the rest of you, but I am far, far more open to trying out new bands and sounds at this time of year than any other time.

Komon-Poetry For The Winter

ShiSho is the next artist I discovered right before I logged on to make my post tonight. They come from Columbus, Ohio. A click to their website will also take you to an interesting version of "Get Behind Me Santa!" This track just about sums up the meaning of the holidays for quite few of us, if we were truly honest with ourselves.

ShiSho-Merry Christmas, Now Leave!

Todd MacEwen shared with me, and gave me permission to share with you all, another voice that was new to me, but has been around in the Canadian music scene for quite a while, and may no doubt familiar to quite a few in America. He simply goes by Valdy, and he was recently in the SPUD 102 studio and played this live for Todd to share with all of you.

Valdy-Secret Santa

And while on the topic of SPUD 102, what better time than now to share with you today's radio spot.

SPUD 102 12/19/2007

Again, thanks for reading and listening.