My last few Albums Of The Day were just EPs, very short releases. But today, I'm making up for it by featuring a collection of 42 tracks totaling just over 2 hours. From 2001 to 2006, Sufjan Stevens did what you might expect any music professional would do; instead of buying a gift at the store for his friends, he recorded and sometimes wrote a song for them. And he didn't just give them the song, but he also gave us this collection of tracks he recorded from 2001 through 2006. It comes on 5 CDs, each disc containing 7-11 tracks, and includes a booklet with lots of artwork and even a bunch of stickers so you can decorate your copy as you see fit. Some songs are just brief instrumentals even shorter than a minute, while others are full-length songs with lush instrumentation. Much of it, like the Sufjan Stevens non-Christmas releases of the era, are banjo-heavy or keyboard-based versions of classic carols, sometimes instrumental and other times with vocals. Many songs are a bit sad in tone, and a number of the original songs reference personal hardships and relationship problems over the holidays. Although they are not really Christmas-related, a number of versions of hymns like "Holy, Holy, Holy" and "Amazing Grace" are included as well. There's a nearly 7-minute version of "What Child Is This" (called "What Child Is This Anyway?") that is very somber and creepy, and "Hey Guys! It's Christmas Time!" features lots of distorted electric guitar. It's an expansive collection of Christmas material that is certainly not a cohesive album and is of varying styles and quality, but it's an opportunity to celebrate the Christmas season while listening to an artist's experiments of sorts, which is pretty fun and interesting to me. If you've got some favorites or a playlist of favorites from this collection, I'd love to hear it.

Release Year: 2006
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