CD Review: Bob Dylan’s Christmas in the Heart

I don’t really know if the cover is technically a Currier and Ives print or one of those knock-offs that makes me think of Currier and Ives. There are horses, snow, a sleigh, a man in a fur hat and a bushy moustache, and a young woman with a fur muff covering her hands. It’s winter fun circa 1890 the way we think of it, especially if we’ve seen The Magnificent Ambersons. I half expect the sleigh to be overturned as it rounds the corner.

The back cover is a cartoonish silhouette of three kings/wise men riding camels, chasing a very bright star. If you’ve been exposed to the Christmas story as understood by Christians, you’re gonna know who these guys are and where they’re going to wind up right away. We’re immersed in myths, both on the front and on the back; secular winter joys meeting sacred festival celebrations.

Bob Dylan doesn’t mind myths – the man comes out of the folk tradition, and he long ago seemed to have decided that popular culture, at least as it existed during his lifetime, is as ritualized as any ancient murder ballad or tale of a bawdy house. Myths are central to traditions – once something becomes formalized enough to be carried on, it’s at least a step or twelve removed from the original human occurrence which gave birth to the idea at hand. And Christmas – holy cow! It’s had 2000 years to mess with its original intent.

There are those who view Christmas in the Heart with a jaundiced eye, or perhaps with the hope that Dylan is kidding. Not me – I find it to be as moving a work of art as I’ve heard in 2009. For here, with songs representing both the front cover and the back cover, Dylan expresses the view that these myths can be beautiful and essential parts of our souls. Christianity can lead down all sorts of paths both ugly and beautiful, but there is a simple elegance to the basic concept of believing in good will on earth and peace to men. And the commercialization of the holiday represented by its merger with popular culture can lead to greed and banality, but there is a simple joy and delight in the basic ideas of the average pop Christmas song from the middle of the last century.

Which, by the way, is where Dylan is living with this record. The newest song on here, “Do You Hear What I Hear,” debuted in 1962, the same year Dylan released his first album; the oldest songs other than hymns debuted in the early 1940s, just as Dylan did. There was a cultural consensus here that Christmas, while basically a religious holiday, could be celebrated without any reference to God or Jesus. While “Here Comes Santa Claus,” written by Gene Autry, did offer “thanks to the Lord above” for the existence of a jolly elf bringing toys, the majority of the great pop Christmas songs from this era proceeded to create an alternate holiday season, one which revolved around friendship, winter games, mistletoe, trees, and an ever-growing saga of the aforementioned Saint Nicklaus.

Of course, if you lived at this time (as Dylan did) or even in the waning days of it (as I did, born in 1958, and a child in the ’60s when this secular version of Christmas remained a central part of growing up), you know that hymns were pretty much always there, too. The cultural assumption was that Christianity itself didn’t need to be emphasized, but it was always there. (Dylan grew up Jewish in Minnesota, but there’s no way he couldn’t have noticed these songs being dropped into so many of the seasonal offerings for added gravitas.)

From the beginning of his career, Bob Dylan understood that you didn’t have to live the stories told in the songs you sang to understand the truth being conveyed. And the truth of Christmas hymns, as well as Christmas pop, transcends the sacred / secular dichotomy: Coming together as a people to share certain traditions, in this case the exchange of gifts and seasonal fellowship, is a wonderful thing to do. Believe in Jesus, believe in Santa, or believe in neither, the joy is in the human connections forged by what is shared in these songs.

That’s what Dylan is bringing here. His vocals, while gruff and grizzly as they’ve been the last two decades, are emotionally delightful throughout this record. And, frankly, even with all the phlegm, he hits more of the notes than you might think at first – listen to this record on headphones, and you’ll hear a way better sense of pitch than is at first noticeable. His phrasing is as idiosyncratic as ever, and I find myself smiling every time I think he’s not going to match the words to the rhythms of Mel Torme’s “The Christmas Song” or “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” but then he always does. His vocal on “Hark the Herald Angels Sing,” which simply bullies its way to the front of the reverently beautiful female harmonies on the record, is as powerful as anything I’ve ever heard him do. His interpretation of Brave Combo’s version of “Must Be Santa” (complete with the Presidential rhyme verse which hasn’t moved past the Clinton era, though I don’t think there’s a president name or a reindeer to rhyme with Obama) shows he has a sense of whimsy and sheer delight in spitting out words that he hasn’t shown often since “Highway 61 Revisited.”

The arrangements, which most often recall the types one hears on early 60s Nashville records, and which never fall into the treacle of the standard mid-’60s hack jobs like the Ray Conniff Singers, despite what some lazy reviewers may have mentioned, are gorgeous throughout. In fact, it’s possible to simply listen to the guitar playing, or the steel guitar, or the rhythm section, and come out of this record smiling as much as if you pay attention to the singing.

I have a friend who said this album combines two things he doesn’t care for, Christmas and Bob Dylan, and that’s an argument I can’t counter. But, for those of us who love Christmas, especially the music, and who will always give Bob Dylan a chance, this is the greatest gift of the year. For Dylan connects the dots between the myths, deflects the reverence of the hymns and upgrades the seriousness of the secular. Christmas In the Heart is a seriously delightful, and powerfully moving work — best heard with as many people you love as you can round up.

Posted by | December 22, 2009 | Music | Comment 

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