It seems inevitable that an entertainer like Cher would put out a Christmas record. What\u2019s odd is that it took the lady so long to do so. For sixty years, Cher found success as a singer, actress, comedienne, gay icon and cosmetics pusher. Her variety show era in the 1970s would have been the perfect time for Cher to release a holiday album, but it took over 25 studio albums before she decided it was time to wrap her distinct voice around some Christmas carols. <\/p>\n
Christmas <\/i>is Cher\u2019s first album in five years, her last being the ABBA tribute Dancing Queen<\/i> that was released to coincide with her role in the musical comedy Mama Mia! Here We Go Again<\/i>. It\u2019s a collection of original songs, old chestnuts, and some traditional fare. A squarely secular pop record, there are no hymns; Cher\u2019s Christmas record is an office Christmas party. <\/p>\n
Ever since the mammoth success of 1998\u2019s Believe<\/i>, Cher has stuck with her dance diva guise. That means that even on her Christmas album, we get bleepy-bloopy club tunes in which her strange\u2014yet still powerful voice\u2014gets molded and misshapen by studio wizardry. These dance songs are the low points on the album. It\u2019s clear that Cher\u2014like every pop star on the planet after Mariah Carey\u2019s triumph with \u201cAll I Want For Christmas Is You\u201d\u2014is looking to add to the holiday canon with the album\u2019s first single, \u201cDJ Play A Christmas Song,\u201d a tinsel-covered \u201cBelieve\u201d retread. Like her big dance hits, \u201cDJ Play A Christmas Song\u201d is a seemingly poignant, melancholy ballad that is set to robo-beats as Cher roars the sorta-inspirational lyrics.<\/p>\n
Christmas<\/i> hits the high notes when Cher hangs up her silver, glittery wigs and goes retro. Christmas is inherently campy and Christmas music<\/i> even more so, so Cher is a natural at warbling the familiar tunes. She also gets a really impressive guest list: Stevie Wonder, Darlene Love, and Cyndi Lauper, among others, show up to share the spotlight. In fact, these fellow pop legends threaten to steal the show from our Oscar-winning headliner. Wonder\u2019s \u201cWhat Christmas Means To Me\u201d is a fun, funky duet in which Cher gets to stand back and let the Motown icon spin his magic. Love joins the former Mrs. Bono on the Phil Spector classic \u201cChristmas (Baby Please Come Home)\u201d and the two longtime pals rip through the classic with infectious joy. (A fun bit of trivia: Cher recorded \u201cChristmas (Baby Please Come Home)\u201d before on comedienne Rosie O\u2019Donnell\u2019s Christmas charity record as a duet with the then-Queen of Nice.) And as if to remind herself and her audiences that she once had designs on being a rock star, she does a great take on Chuck Berry\u2019s \u201cRun Rudolph Run\u201d that hews closely to the original with Cher\u2019s droll interpretation of the song. Equally witty is Cher\u2019s take on the sexy\u2014if materialistic\u2014\u201cSanta Baby,\u201d which vamps with insouciant good humor. Best of all is her torchy take on \u201cPlease Come Home For Christmas,\u201d which is quite brilliant some of the best singing Cher has done in her long career. <\/p>\n
There are some clunkers on Christmas. <\/i>Aside from the dance songs, Cher also stumbles on \u201cDrop Top Sleigh Ride\u201d a collaboration with Tyga, that tries to marry rapper\u2019s trap with her pop sound, but it sounds awkward and stilted. Also, her duet with Michael Bubl\u00e9 on the Canadian crooner\u2019s \u201cHome\u201d is a plodding bore that strands the two charismatic performers in A\/C pablum. <\/p>\n
Cher has warned her audiences that another ABBA tribute album is imminent. If she\u2019s plotting musical sequels, she should do another Christmas album, but embrace the snow-capped, garlanded standards of the Great American Songbook instead of working so hard to bring her own stamp to Christmas carols. She\u2019s still a distinct and unique singer with an immediately recognizable voice and she enjoys so much good will and fan devotion, that if she recorded a fun, kitschy Christmas record that recalled the Christmas albums of the 1960s, she could stumble on a minor classic. As it is, Christmas<\/i> is fine.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":34900,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6037],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-46767","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-cher","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/93"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46767"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46767"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}