Shownotes
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You can listen to Carpenters’ Christmas Portrait on:
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Links
- Carpenters’ “Superstar”, featured in this classic car ride karaoke scene from Tommy Boy.
- Episode 3: “The Christmas Draft”, where Marc drafts “Merry Christmas Darling” & discusses at length with Michael & Aimee. Check it out for a more thorough discussion on the track.
- Brian Wilson & The Beach Boys
- Brian Wilson (self-titled, 1988). Certain segments and tracks on this record strongly resemble Richard’s on tracks like “It Came Upon A Midnight Clear”.
- That’s Why God Made the Radio (2012), which Michael felt too strongly resembled Richard’s vocal style (and not in a good way).
- We listened to Christmas Portrait (Special Edition) from 1984, which is a compilation of select tracks from…
- Christmas Portrait (original 1978 release)
- An Old-Fashioned Christmas (1984)
- Karen’s voice type is contralto, which is a somewhat rare vocal range you might recognize from artists like…
- May Crowning, you know, where songs like “Ave Maria” actually belong.
- “Is ‘Ave Maria’ really a Christmas song?” by Marc Minter, a senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Diana, TX. The correct answer is, “it’s not.”
- Michael’s “A Christmas Song” judgements
- S Tier: Nat “King” Cole
- So close! Amy Grant (see Episode 3 for the context behind Michael’s “branded by an iron” joke)
- Honorable Mention: Bing Crosby
- Clunker: Christina Aguilera
- Surprisingly Good, But Blows It: Shawn Mendes
- Just No: Pentatonix
- Self Important Rubbish: Michael Bublé
- More on the history behind Merry Christmas Darling
- The app Michael mentioned is Marvis Pro, one of the finest music players available today
- “It’s Over 9000!”
- HBO’s The Last of Us Trailer (Marc was confusing it with the HBO 2023 Lineup trailer)
♫︎