Music for children that adults can enjoy as well #5: A Christmas Gift For You from Phil Spector

Music blogger extraordinaire Robin Seamer (Breaking More Waves) puts on his party hat and pulls out a Christmas cracker of an album for us in his festive guest post on music that kids and adults can enjoy together...

With Christmas now on our doorstep last summer seems an age away doesn’t it? Although if you happened to be in Camp Bestival’s Bollywood Bar last July on Friday afternoon when the Sunday Best Forum Allstars were DJing you may remember feeling slightly confused as for a few minutes the likes of Slade’s Merry Xmas Everybody and Shakin’ Stevens Merry Christmas Everyone blasted out from the decks. Small children began to look round excitedly, tugging on their parents sleeves. “Has Santa come early this year Mum?” they asked.

Besides the puzzlement and awkward moment for mums and dads that these tunes caused, there was a reason behind the songs being played in the middle of summer. Like it or not a great Christmas song is a great song, at whatever time of year you play it. Yet because of the lyrics and emotional connections we have with Christmas tunes we only ever put them on in the lead up to the big day.

So this December, if you’re looking for an album that both adults and children can enjoy together, look no further than A Christmas Gift For You from Phil Spector. It’s chock full of bold and brilliant girl-group songs, that if truth be told sound superb whatever time of year you play them – even in a Bollywood Bar at a music festival.  Originally released on November 22, 1963, the day of John F. Kennedy's assassination, the album takes Spector’s trademark wall of sound production, the roster of artists on his label (The Crystals, The Ronettes, Darlene Love and Bob B. Soxx & The Blue Jeans) and a host of awesome Christmas tunes to create an album that is both joyous, impossible not to sing along to and timeless in its appeal. Yet when the record was first released it wasn’t an instant hit; it took a re-release from the Beatles' Apple label nearly a decade on to confirm these songs as Yuletide high-energy classics.

From The Ronettes top-notch take on Frosty The Snowman, Darlene Love’s Spector penned Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) to The Crystals hyper-jolly version of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer, this album has an essential place in anyone’s record collection – no matter how old or young you are.

The Ronettes - Frosty The Snowman