Doobie Brother is takin’ it to the Hallmark stores
Published 11/29/05
When Michael McDonald was takin’ it to the streets and takin’ his Doobie Brothers up the rock and roll charts some 30 years ago, who’d have thought he would someday be crooning seasonal favorites on a Hallmark holiday release.
Well, some day is here. “Through Many Winters: A Christmas Album,” hit retail a few weeks ago and McDonald is taking it to listeners—like me—whose heads still ring with tunes like “Minute By Minute,” “What A Fool Believes,” “Real Love” and “It Keeps You Runnin’.” Okay, and for regular folk who just happen to like traditional Christmas songs.
But not your usual, typical, traditional carols. Ex Doobie McDonald crosses the normal boundaries of Christmas music with his own unique arrangements of holiday classics.
The CD is available exclusively through Hallmark Gold Crown stores and not at the vinyl hangouts where you used to buy Doobie Brothers LPs and tapes. All songs feature that instantly recognizable voice of the artist usually known as “the blue-eyed soul singer.” Of McDonald, Rolling Stone once said, “This man could sing the New York telephone book and break your heart.”
A five-time Grammy Award winning singer/songwriter and composer of the aforementioned hits, McDonald is yet to rely on the lyrics of the white pages in a career that, as vivid memory has it, took off my senior year of college. That’s when a guy who followed all things rock and roll came down the hall of my dorm and announced that Michael McDonald had left Steely Dan to sing lead for the Doobies. Oh. I’d never heard of Michael McDonald.
But I did when McDonald, after joining the southern boogie rock band in 1977, turned them into a heavily syncopated soul oriented group with jazz and R&B inflections. Transforming the Doobies into a hit making machine, he became one of the biggest voices of the rock generation,
When the Doobies gig ended in 1982, McDonald went solo and recorded memorable singles such as “I Keep Forgettin’ (Every Time You’re Near),” “I Gotta Try” and “Sweet Freedom.” Then there were the duets where he shared the spotlight with James Ingram (“Yah Mo Be There”) and with Patti LaBelle “On My Own”).
You may have seen McDonald recently on PBS, performing ’60s Motown songs. That’s because, in recent years, he’s returned to the music that inspired him originally. Not only has McDonald performed a collection of Motown cover songs, but he’s recorded them on the Motown label. The first project, “Motown,” earned two Grammy nominations. Motown 2 was certified Gold within months of its release last year.
This year, in a fundraiser for Katrina victims, McDonald joined a band of other artists to record “The Heart of America,” which they sang before Game Three of the World Series.
This past Sunday night McDonald was takin’ it—his new holiday CD-- to Emeril Live on the Food Network, where he played selections from “Through the Many Winters” with Emeril’s kitchen band.
In addition to familiar Christmas fare, the CD features a couple of new songs by McDonald, including the title song, co-written with his wife Amy Holland, a centerpiece song which urges listeners to look for a sign in the heavens during the bleakest of winters.
The second McDonald composition, “Christmas On The Bayou” is based on a French-Cajun children’s song entitled “St. Nicholas.” This fun song finds McDonald playing Cajun accordion along with acoustic guitar and bass.
If any song showcases the McDonald cords, it’s “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” with its jazz and R&B touches.
“Come, O Come Emanuel/What Month Was Jesus Born” is a blend of reggae with an African American spiritual that contains a fun call and response with a soulful choir.
In a duet with Holland, McDonald then changes the scenery, moving into a Tennessee mountain setting, and the century, with the 14th century Celtic carol, “Wexford Carol,” which begins “Good people all, this Christmas-time/Consider well and bear in mind/What our good God for us has done/In sending his beloved Son…” What with its dulcimer and fiddler, polished L.A. pop this ain’t. But hey, this is Michael minus the Doobies.
Of course, in the interest of full disclosure, I should note that as a Michael McDonald devotee, I’m predisposed to buy and favorably review.
What a fool believes, he sees.
When Michael McDonald was takin’ it to the streets and takin’ his Doobie Brothers up the rock and roll charts some 30 years ago, who’d have thought he would someday be crooning seasonal favorites on a Hallmark holiday release.
Well, some day is here. “Through Many Winters: A Christmas Album,” hit retail a few weeks ago and McDonald is taking it to listeners—like me—whose heads still ring with tunes like “Minute By Minute,” “What A Fool Believes,” “Real Love” and “It Keeps You Runnin’.” Okay, and for regular folk who just happen to like traditional Christmas songs.
But not your usual, typical, traditional carols. Ex Doobie McDonald crosses the normal boundaries of Christmas music with his own unique arrangements of holiday classics.
The CD is available exclusively through Hallmark Gold Crown stores and not at the vinyl hangouts where you used to buy Doobie Brothers LPs and tapes. All songs feature that instantly recognizable voice of the artist usually known as “the blue-eyed soul singer.” Of McDonald, Rolling Stone once said, “This man could sing the New York telephone book and break your heart.”
A five-time Grammy Award winning singer/songwriter and composer of the aforementioned hits, McDonald is yet to rely on the lyrics of the white pages in a career that, as vivid memory has it, took off my senior year of college. That’s when a guy who followed all things rock and roll came down the hall of my dorm and announced that Michael McDonald had left Steely Dan to sing lead for the Doobies. Oh. I’d never heard of Michael McDonald.
But I did when McDonald, after joining the southern boogie rock band in 1977, turned them into a heavily syncopated soul oriented group with jazz and R&B inflections. Transforming the Doobies into a hit making machine, he became one of the biggest voices of the rock generation,
When the Doobies gig ended in 1982, McDonald went solo and recorded memorable singles such as “I Keep Forgettin’ (Every Time You’re Near),” “I Gotta Try” and “Sweet Freedom.” Then there were the duets where he shared the spotlight with James Ingram (“Yah Mo Be There”) and with Patti LaBelle “On My Own”).
You may have seen McDonald recently on PBS, performing ’60s Motown songs. That’s because, in recent years, he’s returned to the music that inspired him originally. Not only has McDonald performed a collection of Motown cover songs, but he’s recorded them on the Motown label. The first project, “Motown,” earned two Grammy nominations. Motown 2 was certified Gold within months of its release last year.
This year, in a fundraiser for Katrina victims, McDonald joined a band of other artists to record “The Heart of America,” which they sang before Game Three of the World Series.
This past Sunday night McDonald was takin’ it—his new holiday CD-- to Emeril Live on the Food Network, where he played selections from “Through the Many Winters” with Emeril’s kitchen band.
In addition to familiar Christmas fare, the CD features a couple of new songs by McDonald, including the title song, co-written with his wife Amy Holland, a centerpiece song which urges listeners to look for a sign in the heavens during the bleakest of winters.
The second McDonald composition, “Christmas On The Bayou” is based on a French-Cajun children’s song entitled “St. Nicholas.” This fun song finds McDonald playing Cajun accordion along with acoustic guitar and bass.
If any song showcases the McDonald cords, it’s “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” with its jazz and R&B touches.
“Come, O Come Emanuel/What Month Was Jesus Born” is a blend of reggae with an African American spiritual that contains a fun call and response with a soulful choir.
In a duet with Holland, McDonald then changes the scenery, moving into a Tennessee mountain setting, and the century, with the 14th century Celtic carol, “Wexford Carol,” which begins “Good people all, this Christmas-time/Consider well and bear in mind/What our good God for us has done/In sending his beloved Son…” What with its dulcimer and fiddler, polished L.A. pop this ain’t. But hey, this is Michael minus the Doobies.
Of course, in the interest of full disclosure, I should note that as a Michael McDonald devotee, I’m predisposed to buy and favorably review.
What a fool believes, he sees.
posted by Jack W. Williams | 10:06 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home