Month: November 2017

Puller – Saviour of the Fools (from Happy Christmas Vol. 1)

How often do you here of a band being so proud of a song that, well after the group has broken up, they create a website dedicated to the song. That’s just what Mike Lewis, formerly of Puller, did. Unfortunately, the site only existed briefly in 2011, so if you want to see if now, you need to visit the The Wayback Machine.

I never really got much into the band. I liked the What’s Mine At Twilight album and #1 Fan was fun, but given the amount of time that I spent in my adolescence listening to Tooth & Nail, I never really connected with their music. That said, I love this song.

I’ll just leave you with the lyrics:

So endless I’ve been taken away as patience yields to anger
As a world moves and bends to waves of sin that will not end
Weightless I fall from Grace, take the pause and wish it away
So many will be present so few will see and know.

Oh Savior of the Fools, Oh Savior of the Fools

Tapered lives that burn within surrendered to a life less lived
A crowd of rolling thunder that cannot make a sound
A day of a downcast fool, who finds a chance inside a baby’s eyes
When no one else will live, misunderstood as him.

Oh Savior of the Fools, Oh Savior of the Fools

And in my weakness I vanish with air,
To bow and tremble at the power in His hands
And in my darkness I’m visited again, by the still small voice Who calls
A fool to be a hero for Love

For Love, For Love, For Love, For Love, For Love

Christmas lights and trees can’t heal, broken lives and hearts that feel
The loneliness of fallen dreams, that leaves nothing at all
Moments pass a star to rise, a Baby’s born but born to die
To leave this world a light that cannot be taken out

Oh Savior of the Fools, Oh Savior of the Fools

And in my weakness I manage to relive,
The tear filled eyes of wise men standing in awe of Him
And in my darkness I’m visited again, by the still small voice that was born
On a silent night, to bring a life, for Love

For Love, for Love, for Love, for Love, for Love

Words by Mike Lewis

Oh yeah, Stavesacre also covered this and it’s excellent. Some days I like it better than the original. The link below is the only place that I’ve seen it other than a digital sampler that you got by buying some thing from zambooie.com one Christmas season. I think that I bought something just to get the sampler to here the song.

Pedro The Lion – I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day (from I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day)

Depressing Christmas music is kind of its own genre. Most Christmas songs are meant to be festive and joyous, but then you get some songs that are meant to be reflective. Beyond that, there’s a whole level beneath that of music that just depresses you (See Mark Kozelek’s Christmas album for an example of this). While recording under the Pedro The Lion moniker, David Bazan hit that reflective note, but the Christmas stuff that he’s released since he started releasing under his own name is just plain depressing. A lot of that is probably due to his abandoning of his Christian faith. After that, his music lost what little hope it had. But before we go too far down that rabbit hole, I’ve included one of the earlier songs which really suits his style. It’s critical and reflective, but still includes hope. One of the reason that I lost touch with his music for a few years was this loss of hope.

There are a few other renditions that are worth hearing:

The Civil Wars:

Beta Radio:

MxPx – Christmas Day (from Punk Rawk Christmas)

Sure you may be sick of pop-punk by now, but this MxPx song is worth another listen. Although many of their peers and tourmates made it famous, (for a while it seemed like touring with them was one step to breaking big, see Good Charlotte, The Ataris, etc) they never managed to write that one song to propel them into the mainstream. Chick Magnet was fun, but once they signed to A&M, it seemed like they couldn’t just find that hit song.

Anyways, they used to release a Christmas song every year to their fan club. The first of which was Christmas Day. It was so good that Tooth and Nail Records managed to convince them to include it on their Happy Christmas 2 compilation, along with a great rendition of You’re a Mean One, Mr Grinch by Sixpence None The Richer. After listening to their entire, exhaustive discography, it’s still my favourite track of theirs.

Bad Religion – God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen (from Christmas Songs)

They say that the best satire is almost indistinguishable from what they are trying to lampoon. Bad Religion’s Christmas Songs is just that. I guess it should be obvious when the band is fronted by such an outspoken naturalist as Greg Graffin that they’re not taking this seriously, but you’d be tough to listen to this without that back story and think that this was somehow mocking or re-purposing the song. The band has always had a great ear for melody and that comes through here.

This song has been covered too many times to really list all of them here. So I’ll just mention a few of my favourites:

August Burns Red (you’ll see they’re name a lot over the next month)

Barenaked Ladies & Sarah McLachlan

Bright Eyes

Almonzo

Least of These

The Beautiful Mistake – A Cradle in Bethlehem (from A Santa Cause: It’s a Punk Rock Christmas)

I love Spotify and streaming in general, but it’s never going to have everything. The first track on the blog to not be found on streaming services in this gem from a 14-year old compilation from Immortal Records. I picked this up mostly due to it featuring a track from MxPx and the least famous ex-frontman of Further Seems Forever, Jason Gleason. I love the way that the song builds. In many ways, it’s a typical emo song from the early 2000s. The guitars seem to somehow both plod and drive at the same time

After listening to this song for a while, I was a little surprised when I finally heard Nat King Cole’s version of it (He didn’t write it but it’s definitely the most popular).  The Beautiful Mistake give it a very different energy and for someone that has merely a passing interest of singers like Cole, I prefer this version. Lauryn Hill covered it a couple years ago as well, but it’s definitely more in the vein of Nat King Cole. Sleeping At Last also has a version, but for my ears, this is the only one that I’ll really listen to.

Sufjan Stevens – Come On! Let’s Boogey to the Elf Dance! (from Songs For Christmas)

Sometimes I want to blame Sufjan Stevens for every indie artist wanting to record their own Christmas songs and the plethora of compilations that are now out there. I think the story is fairly well known by now. Stevens originally started records EPs of Christmas songs, (covers and originals) giving them out to friends instead of Christmas cards. Inevitably, they wound up on the Internet and became so popular that eventually he released the first five as a box set. I haven’t bothered to look if there are any more past the 10 that have been officially released. But with that many EPs, it’s tough to believe that there’s much more ground for him to cover here.

I’ve always been a fan of his acoustic, folkier stuff, with Seven Swans being my favourite album of his. So naturally, I gravitate more towards the early Christmas EPs than the latter, although Christmas Unicorn will probably be featured in a later post. This song has a mood the symbolizes a lot of what people want to feel around Christmas time. The lyrics evoke a theme of nostalgia, sitting around a fire and having a good time. It’s tough to read too much into this song, so it’s nice to just enjoy it for what it is.

I haven’t really come across any covers of this song, but I haven’t really looked either.

Let’s start this with a song that’s not really a Christmas song, but fits enough that it’s worth mentioning.

mewithoutYou – A Stick, A Carrot & String (from It’s All Crazy, It’s All False, It’s All a Dream, It’s Alright)

Almost anyone that’s talked to me about music will have heard me talk about mewithoutYou. They’re tough to categorize, starting out as a bit of a screamo band, with the lead singer often yelling instead of screaming/singing. If you want a real history on the band, check Tooth & Nail’s Labeled podcast. The song itself is from an album that still features the singing/yelling but the instrumentation is much folkier and lighter than their first 3 records. The record contains songs about a Sufi myth (The Fox, the Crow & the Cookie), King David bartering with the Angel of Death, and even a song referring to God as Allah. (a rarity for a music label with the majority of its sales in a Christian market)

Now this song really tells the story of Jesus’ life, from birth through to death/resurrection, but given the intro and feel, it’s easy to lump it in with Christmas music. Given the band’s typical sound, it’s definitely out of place and fairly direct lyrically, especially when compared to Aaron Weiss’ penchant for telling odd stories. Verse 1 has animals at the manger foretelling Jesus’ life, Verse 3 brings it back to more a Christian story (“No clever thought, no gift to bring, requires our lowly, lovely King. Come you empty-handed you don’t need anything”) And the song ends with a lyric that has always stuck with me and simplified the Christian message.

“And the snake who held the world a stick, a carrot & a string, was crushed beneath the foot of your not wanting anything”

A lot of this blog will probably highlight cover version of songs, but with this one, it’s the original that’s really impacted me. Dustin Kensrue (lead singer of Thrice) included a cover of this on the re-release of his Christmas album, The Good Night is Still Everywhere. It’s ok, but the production quality is pretty poor and doesn’t differ too much from the original.