‘another fckn xmas’ was born out a dumb joke I kept making last fall to a few friends – I had noticed that there seemed to be a growing trend around local artists making Holiday / Xmas themed songs (which it feels like hasn’t been ‘cool’ since like the 80s or something, Mariah Carey and a few superstars aside?). I thought it would be funny to write a dark, alternative song with a holiday theme called ‘another fckn xmas’, centered around the loss of my mother, who passed away suddenly a few years ago and the impact of that loss on the holiday season (and really every major life event / holiday).

I suppose the ‘joke’ here is that most holiday songs are nostalgic in a sweet way, and I was interested in subverting the formula a bit, going darker with it – like if Porches and Jim-E Stack made ‘Blue Christmas’ or something. ‘Alone At Christmas’ (an incredible Beach Boys song if you haven’t heard it!) but for 2021 (or I guess I mean 2020, since I wrote it last fall and then sat on it for a year before finishing it lol).

As soon as I started writing it, it was no longer funny (perhaps unsurprisingly? lol), but actually extremely cathartic to sing through all the feelings that come along with losing someone who is so important in your life. My mother was one of my best friends, we spoke at length on the phone all the time (to the point where I knew I couldn’t call her to ask a quick question, unless I had at least 30min because she just was not one to get off the phone lol), and she was very much the center of my extended family. Every life event now is framed through that loss, through her absence. Xmas, birthdays, you name it, when they come around there is still joy (we’re still a close family, and we’re doing ok) but there is definitely something (or rather, someone) missing.

In any case, I really didn’t have any plans to release it once I had finished writing it – I felt like it was just way too confessional (even for me), and wasn’t really for other folks in the first place. This was until I played it for my wife the morning after I had finished writing the end section, she listened on my headphones in bed while I was downstairs making coffee. When I came upstairs she had tears streaming down her face while listening, and after playing it through several times she kept insisting that I had to share it with others. The pandemic was still raging pretty hard at this point, so many people were affected by loss and couldn’t see family due to lockdown / travel restrictions etc, and she thought that the subject matter would probably resonate for lots of people – even though it was just about my own specific situation.