posted on 12.24.11
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Samit Sarkar - “The Christmas Song”

Last year, we at Destructoid put our heads together and recorded The Destructoid Christmas Album. It went over pretty well, and my contribution — a cover of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” — turned out fine. (For more details, check out my original post.)

We thought, “Why not do it again?” Fewer staffers contributed this year, but I think The Second Annual Destructoid Christmas Album is just as full of holiday cheer as the inaugural edition. I decided to record a version of “The Christmas Song” — y’know, the one that goes, Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…

The recording process was a bit more ambitious this time around, because I decided that in addition to my singing and guitar playing, I wanted a bass part. Unfortunately, I don’t own a double bass, and my keyboard doesn’t have it as one of its built-in “instruments,” either. So I went with something called “finger bass.” I still didn’t have a better option for recording the guitar part than sticking my Rock Band microphone in front of my guitar’s sound hole, and this year, I decided to use the same mic for recording my singing (even though it doesn’t have a wind screen, which isn’t ideal). I recorded and mixed everything in Audacity.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is that you shouldn’t expect to hear a brilliantly engineered recording when you hit “play.” I’m sure someone could “tweak the levels” to get a better-sounding song, but I don’t really know what I’m doing when it comes to that stuff. Still, I’m not unhappy with the final product.

Enjoy, and happy holidays!

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posted on 12.24.11
nevver:

Calvin and Hobbes

nevver:

Calvin and Hobbes

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posted on 12.24.10
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Merry Christmas, Internet.

Y’know, I’ve been wanting to do something like this — record a song for you all, as a Christmas present — for a while now (at least since before last Christmas). But being the lazy procrastinator that I am, I just never found the time to do it, or couldn’t figure out the best way to go about it, or couldn’t decide on which song I wanted to do, or was simply too terrified by the prospect of recording my own (singing) voice and putting it out there on the web for people to hear. I mean, I love singing, and I know I have a half-decent voice, but other people usually only hear it in a few specific contexts: (A) the rest of my family, when I’m in the shower; (B) my friends or family, when I’m playing Rock Band or some other video game that involves singing; (C) my friends, when we’re all at a karaoke bar.

This year, though, I had a reason to record a song.

As you may know, I write for a videogame website called Destructoid. The site’s editors come up with clever, funny ideas all the time, and a few weeks ago, one of them emailed the rest of the editors out of the blue with a random thought: Why don’t we all record ourselves singing Christmas carols and put it up on the site? He claims he was inebriated when he sent that email, and the tone of the message was basically, “Kidding! Unless you guys all think it could be cool…”

We did, and a bunch of Destructoid editors — whether or not they thought they could sing — recorded songs for The Destructoid Christmas Album.

My contribution was “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”; you can listen to it above. It’s just me and my guitar, although I suppose I should fess up and say that I recorded the accompaniment first and then sang over it. (One of my greatest failings in life is that I still can’t play the guitar and sing at the same time.) I should also note that I feel like this isn’t necessarily my best work; my voice wasn’t in tip-top shape when I recorded this on Monday evening, but I didn’t have the time to get it done before then (because of, y’know, that whole graduation thing and all).

Even so, I hope you enjoy it, and I hope you have yourself a Merry Christmas! Thanks for listening, and for reading my Tumblr all year.

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posted on 12.22.10
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“Please Come Home For Christmas”
Eagles
Please Come Home For Christmas [Single] (1978)

I heard this on the radio the other day, and I woke up with it stuck in my head. It’s one of my favorite Christmas songs — I love bluesy stuff like this.

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posted on 12.3.10 it’s ok to wish me a merry christmas

inthefade:

If the War on Christmas actually exists, I’ve been sitting it out. Please, feel free to wish me a Merry Christmas even though I’m not religious. I don’t expect you to replace it with a generic Happy Holidays. I don’t care if there’s a nativity in front of your store.  I don’t mind if children sing Silent Night. I know there are anti-Christmas grinches around. Just because I’m not a participant in your religion doesn’t mean I expect you to stop celebrating it in front of me. I want to embrace your joy and your season. 

To quote Bill Murray in Scrooged:

“It’s Christmas Eve. It’s the one night of the year when we all act a little nicer, we smile a little easier, we cheer a little more. For a couple of hours out of the whole year we are the people that we always hoped we would be.”

So go ahead, wish me a Merry Christmas.

[there’s more; click through to read it all]

Same here. I was raised Hindu, but I’m completely agnostic — and yet I love this time of year.

(Source: openareas)

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posted on 12.25.09 Merry Christmas, Tumblr.

Maybe I’ll sing you a song…next year. (Don’t count on it.) I still love you all, though!

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posted on 12.25.09
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charliesuh:

thevelcro:

Ladies and Germs, the finest Christmas album ever composed.

Word. Merry Christmas!

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posted on 12.19.09
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natface:

Christmas Is/Frosty the Snowman — Run DMC/uh, kid singers?

Have listened to this five times already.

(from the Bootie Blog Mash-Up Christmas album)

*bobbing head*

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