Just a couple more days until Christmas, but there's still lots of local Christmas music to check out.
Ray Rude from the Builders and the Butchers has put together a new compilation called A Festive Odyssey Holiday Collection Vol. 1, enlisting local musicians from bands like Wooden Indian Burial Ground, the We Shared Milk, and Run On Sentence to contribute a mixture of originals and classic. There's Operation Mission's spacey take on "Silver Bells," Dream Physique's twangy "Christmas at the Bar," and lots more. Right now it's available as a free download on Bandcamp, although donations are warmly accepted.
A Happy Death offer their take of the Sonics' "I Don't Believe in Christmas," a fuzzed-out howler that A Happy Death take to the dark underground. For those tired of holiday schmaltz, this one's for you. It's also available on Bandcamp as a name-your-price download.
Lastly, it wouldn't be a PDX Xmas without A PDX MAS, the two-volume local compilation of Christmas songs that originally surfaced in 2009 and 2010. Produced by Typhoon cohort Paul Laxer, in includes tons of holiday songs, with contributions from Typhoon (twice), Onuinu, Wild Ones, Hosannas, Aan, Jared Mees and the Grown Children, and lots more. That one, too, is available on Bandcamp as a name-your-price download.