Christmas and 2019

So here's our Christmas album, a collection of classic Christmas covers and original instrumental bits.  It's a really good Christmas album and the material on it is brand new, recorded less than a month before it was released. This one is pretty self explanatory, so instead I'll be talking about what 2019 holds for The Brown Christmas.

First and foremost, we're just about up to date with releasing all the new albums we have recorded. This March will be three years straight of releasing a new album every month, and I figure that's a good stopping point. We no longer have piles of recorded audio backing up our output pipeline; so if we were to continue at this pace we'd literally have to be recording, editing, and making art for a new album every month. Truthfully we probably could do that, but I'm not sure for how long without loosing our minds. This isn't to say we will no longer be releasing new albums; we'll just be slowing down to maybe one every few months, or basically whenever we have new material and time to edit it.

Not having a new Brown Christmas album to put out every month will also allow me time to shift my focus to some other projects. I'd like to go through all the music we've release these past three years and make some weird music videos to accompany some of the tracks. I'm also hoping to get our really early albums cleaned up and made available on our bandcamp, along with some bonus tracks.

Aside from Brown Christmas related stuff, I'm planning to start going through the hours upon hours of solo material I have recorded as Chalk Harmonica Vibe and gradually start trickling out albums for that project. There are also several new side aliases and collaborations I hope to release as well, including my newage/ambient project Bathroom Plants. So clearly there will be no shortage of musical output coming this year.

Get ready for new, exciting, strange sounds coming your way in 2019!

Christmas 2017

Although our name is The Brown Christmas we are not, nor have we ever been, a 'Christmas' band. That said I always look forward to putting out a new Christmas album. There's such a wealth of material to draw from, and it's always fun to 'get in the spirit' with some mangled Christmas merriment.

I have noticed that on every Christmas album we put out there's always an exceptionally abrasive song, usually with me screaming over a wall of sound. This time it's a cover of "Hey Santa," which is my personal favorite on this release. I was trying to pull up the lyrics for the Carnie and Wendy Wilson "Hey Santa," but instead got the Straight No Chaser "Hey Santa." Shortly after I started screaming I realized my error, but there was nothing to do but to continue belting out lyrics to a song I've never heard before.

The title comes from an event several years ago when I was working retail. Christmas was over, all our holiday merchandise went on sale at increasingly large discounts. Eventually items were 90% off and everything was gone; everything except a 4ft X 5ft X 18in display of candy canes. We just couldn't sell these, so I was told to throw them out.

Now my memory is a little fuzzy, but these were the typical boxes of candy canes you see for sale, I think there are a dozen or so canes in a box. I put these into larger cardboard boxes which might have fit 24 boxes of candy canes. I filled up about six boxes, put them out by the dumpster, then loaded them into my car when my shift was over. So using those numbers that's around 1728 candy canes. For the album title we used Thirty-six since in seemed like a funny, yet still plausible number.

Only a few days into having these at home did I realize that neither my family nor myself particularly enjoyed candy canes. However I think you will enjoy this album.

Discrete Santa

Warm up those chestnuts, slurp down a frothy glass of nog, and get the christmas spirit deep inside you; it's Christmas on Craigslist again!

It's a bit of a Christmas miracle that this album exists at all; we recorded these tracks back in December 2014 with the intention of releasing the album the following year. Foolishly I didn't back the files up, and the hard drive they were on became corrupted. It seemed as if this jam session was lost to the computer gods. However after some research into data recovery I discovered that the files were just trapped in purgatory. Then it was just a matter of having the time and money to recover everything.

I was thrilled when everything was fully recovered and I had an opportunity to listen to what we had recorded for the first time in 2 years. There are some really solid Craigslist classics on here like "Mistress for Christmas" and "16 Days of Christmas", not to mention some non-craigslist originals like "Hey Who Put these Chestnuts Here?" and "Santa Doesn't want to go to Work Today."

These are sure to become your new favorite carols to sing. Maybe you'll even hear a track played on Jon Solomon's 25hr Christmas Marathon on WPRB this year.

Enjoy Your Christmas and remember to be discrete!

Christmas Retrospective part 3

Our most recent Christmas album came out 2 years ago and was a double mini album, if that makes sense. The first disc contained new christmas recordings from 2013, a couple of these tracks were new craigslist Christmas songs, and the rest were our rendition of christmas classics. Unofficially this is Dicks Pics volume 3 1/2.

The second disc was something rare indeed; The Brown Christmas rehearsing. These recordings were from 2012 in preparation for a noise fest we were playing. Basically these were our favorite, and most easy to recreate, songs from A Craigslist Christmas. One of my personally favorite moments from this disc is the addition of a brief break down in "Got No Girl" were Joemazing pounds out a maniacal rendition of "The Little Drummer Boy."

The spirit of christmas was alive and well in our bowels and with a little time, construction paper, glue, glitter, wrapping paper, and anything lying around on the floor, we created custom stocking packaging for each set of discs. We still have some available for sale, although if you purchase one you won't get it by christmas because preoccupied with various other christmas duties.

Christmas Retrospective 2

Oh no, it's Christmas again! It took three years for us to put out another Christmas album, but I believe the wait was well worth it. As the name suggests A Craigslist Christmas is not only a christmas themed album, but is also volume two of our Craigslist series.

For those not in the know, several years ago we started scouring craigslist casual encounters for the dirtiest posts we could find and would then use them as improvised lyrics for songs. So it seemed only natural that when Christmas came along some of these posts got kind of festive, and thus A Craigslist Christmas was born.

The tracks on this album are delightfully dirty and seasonally sexy. Highlights include the upbeat rocking "Got No Girl", The abrasive droney "Christmas Cums for Santa", and the hip-hop classic "My Name is George" which is one of our all time favorite craigslist tracks ever.

Christmas Retrospective Part 1

It's the most christmasy time of year and The Brown Christmas has a new Christmas album coming your way soon, but first take a retrospective look at our older christmas albums. Up first; The Brown Christmas Presents: A Very Special Brown Christmas, Christmas Special: for You and Yours
Recorded about 10 years ago when The Brown Christmas was just a (Santa) baby, and officially released 7 years ago. Aged like a fine glass of milk, our first Christmas album sounds quite primitive and minimalist compared to the recent material we've been releasing and rightly so. Some of these songs were recorded less than a year after our formation. I didn't even have a proper synth yet, and was instead banging on cheap toy keyboards running through pedals.

I think this was also the only album for which we've done a proper "release" show. In quite grand fashion we dressed in our christmas bests, decorated our set up with lights, and gave out christmas presents. Several lucky fans received this album with it's very special christmas special poster, a screen printed article of clothing, and our non-christmas themed album; Polish Men in $500 Hats. That performance in it's entirety is available here:

The Most Christmasy time of the Year

Our christmas gift to Jon Solomon. Every year we've submitted music to his 25hr christmas special on wprb he's played something of ours, so here's hoping something from Stocking Stuffer will get played.

Christmas Comes Early

We recently recorded several new tracks for next year's christmas album, and as a special christmas gift to you here is a rough preview of one of these all new christmas classics. It's christmas on craigslist!

Christmas Pharmacy

Stocking Stuffer Now Available

Here's a fantastic last minute christmas present; Stocking Stuffer two mini disc set in crafty paper stocking. Limited edition of 20 each one is different and will be chosen at random. This would also make an acceptable gift for Hanukah, Kwanza, New Years, Flag Day, or whatever. Get it now!

Stocking Stuffer

It's December, the most Christmasy time of the year! Here is our gift to you; Stocking Stuffer available for free download, and very soon available as a limited 2 mini disc set packaged in a one of a kind crafty stocking.

Part One of this album (tracks 1-5) was recorded last December. These include a couple new craigslist inspired christmas songs, as well as some covers of holiday classics.

Part Two (6-9) features new versions of tracks from our previous christmas album; A Craigslist Christmas. These were rehearsal outtakes recorded in preparation for a live set we played in December 2012, which unfortunately there is no footage of. We were so overcome with christmas spirit we forgot the camera.

By next week both this and Beast Friends Forever will be available for purchase; the perfect christmas gift for the whole family!

The Brown Craft Mess

We're getting crafty in the studio in preparation for a very special christmas release.