OK kids. Who here hates Xmas music? I do I do!

Except for “Feliz Navidad.” That song is dope.

Yesterday I was walking up the driveway of the Chipman village post office. The people in the house next door had gone all-out with the trimmings. They’d even gone so far as to mount a couple of Radio Shack speakers on the front porch. The speakers were draped with shiny tinsel and they were blaring wretched Xmas music all over the village main street.

“It’s be-ginn-ing to look a LOT like CHRIS mas.”

It was loud and horribly distorted, in fact if you were to look up the word “blare” in the dictionary you would see a picture of a wretchedly clipped and mutilated seasonal waveform. I shook my fist at the cruel pale December sun and stuck my fingers in my ears.

Inside the post office. My box was completely empty. No greeting cards for Philip! No obscene postcards to shock the village postal employees. Things sure have dried up around here. Starting now you can write to me at my new home in Mope City.

Philip Clark
PO Box 463
4670 Rte. 123
Chipman, NB E4A 3C5
Canada

Anyway, I’m driving to Halifax on Saturday to perform at the Khyber Holiday Toast. You can catch me up on all the gossip then. Last time I was in Halifax I was shocked at all the goings-on that I’d missed. People breaking up, people getting together, unexpected changes. You people have got to let me know this stuff.

Out here in the country, a taste of gossip warms me up like a mug of hot chocolate.

The Khyber bar is shutting down in the new year so it might be my last chance to play there, ever. I used to love the Khyber. I was a bartender there in the summer of ’99. Played some memorable shows over the years, including a couple of birthdays and New Year’s Eves. It’ll be sad to see it go so we’re going to send it off with a bang.

They’re doing all three floors on Saturday, with DJs on the top floor, members show & sale in the ballroom, along with portraits and art stuff and whatnot; and downstairs in the bar it’ll be the Jeff Coll Five, Death By Nostalgia, and me (A/V). It’s a dance party, five bucks and I think it runs from 7PM right until they close at 2.

Rod from Death By Nostalgia is putting together a compilation of Xmas songs that should be available at this event. I contributed a song. Did I mention I hate Xmas music? Well I figured I’d give it my best shot.

At first I was going to contribute a track called “Xmas Tit.” The theory behind the Xmas Tit is that it’s a breast that gives presents instead of milk.

For babies, it’s a life-giving symbol of feminine nurture. For grownups, it’s something sexy that you can’t wait to get your hands on. And for everyone in between, it’s this weird thing that you don’t understand.

But then I came across a sample that has the potential to revolutionize the future of Xianity: “He’s NOT the messiah… he’s a very naughty boy.” So I had to build a jam around it. I recorded the track last night, it’s called “Myrrh Maid” by the 9Volt Sound System and you can download it RIGHT NOW:

myrrh_maid.mp3 [4MB]

Xmas is a stressful time for some people so I want you to close your eyes, relax, listen to this track and picture yourself hitting Roger Whittaker over the head with a board with a nail in it.

xo philip.