Everyone knows that you have to be pretty darn creative to write a song. I think the most creative kind of song is a well-crafted Christmas song. Sure, I enjoy the traditional favorites like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Jingle Bells.” I won’t argue that they are both creative and inspiring. But I have to say, some of the more rock and pop based Christmas songs seem to have that extra touch of elfin magic that inspires holiday wonderment.
One example of Christmas lyrical genius comes to us via the Beach Boys Christmas Album. In it the Beach Boys proclaim in five-part harmony: “Christmas comes this time each year.” Wow. I never thought of it that way. When Elton John belts out: “Step into Christmas, the admission is free” it can’t help but conjure up crisp winter evenings by the fire with family and warm cups of holiday cheer. And who can forget how Band Aid changed the world with the non-condescending “Do They Know It’s Christmas.” Sure, half of the African continent is Muslim and doesn’t believe in Christ, but pay attention to the spirit of the lyrics. I particularly like the spiritual guidance, “Well tonight thank God it’s them instead of you.”
In my opinion, the most creative thing about Christmas is the music and for the artists who make it so colorful I say, “This Christmas I give you my heart…don’t steal it away the very next day.”
Pixel Farm Colorist, Oscar Oboza recently completed film transfer and color correction on the Roots’ “How I Got Over.” The following is an excerpt from Pitchfork’s review of this upcoming Def Jam release:
The breeziest thing the Roots have put forth since “Act Too (Love of My Life)”, probably, the title single from the Roots’ upcoming album is already eliciting a few jeers for loosening the reins (heard someone mention Black Eyed Peas’ sodden “Where Is the Love?”) So what if it doesn’t revisit say, the El-P-inspired spacecraft synths of “Get Busy”? The Roots are virtually taken for granted by now as evocative groove-layers. Here, ?uestlove vies with congas, a low-shimmering organ, and a gorgeous “Who’s worrying ’bout you babe” hooking you in for Black Thought’s poetic license to drop Rwanda like he’s Mr. Lif, whose own stab at this sort of Obama-softened reporting earlier this year wasn’t warm enough. For every housing crisis or Philly shooting, there’s a trope worth revisiting in Black (not bleak) Thought’s reflective mode, and these are some of his blackest thoughts in some time. But unlike those taught him “not to give a f*@%,” his group insists, “Someone has to care”; here, they’d rather worry about the streets rather than glorify them.