Photo: F. Scott Schafer for Decca Records
Today Emmy, Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild award-winner and singer-songwriter Darren Criss announced his debut holiday album, A Very Darren Crissmas is set for release October 8 on Decca Records. The joyous genre-bending collection features special guest appearances by Adam Lambert, Evan Rachel Wood, and Lainey Wilson. The first single is a whimsical take on the timeless classic, “Happy Holidays / The Holiday Season” and you can listen to the song and pre-order the album here.
Produced by multi-Grammy nominee and producer of numerous Grammy-winning hits, Ron Fair, A Very Darren Crissmas showcases Darren’s encyclopedic musical knowledge and features a wildly eclectic collection of songs: big-band standards and novelty tunes, mid-century musical numbers and modern-day folk-pop ballads.
Recorded in 2020 at Nashville’s Faircraft Studios with an A-list lineup of local musicians, Darren also enlists celebrated artists on the 12-song set. Pop star Adam Lambert joins in on the magnificently jazzy “(Everybody’s Waitin’ For) The Man With the Bag,” fellow multihyphenate Evan Rachel Wood lends her heavenly vocals to the classic “Somewhere in My Memory,” and on the album’s sole original, “Drunk on Christmas” features chart-topping and wildly talented country artist Lainey Wilson. Merging country and cocktail jazz to irresistible effect, “Drunk on Christmas” offers a dazzling glimpse into Darren’s sensibilities as a songwriter.
“I always knew that if I ever made a Christmas album, it would have to be much more than just a collection of songs you already knew,” says Criss. “I’d want it to be a journey through songs that not only had a personal significance to my life, but also a unique introduction to songs folks had never heard before, and a re-introduction to a few they might think they know- but have never considered differently. Every eclectic choice led this album to feel astutely true to its namesake: a very, indisputably, ‘me’ Christmas.”
The result is an essential new entry into the holiday-music canon, both thrillingly unpredictable and touched with a timeless sense of Christmas magic.
A Very Darren Crissmas Tracklisting:
1.Happy Holidays / The Holiday Season
2.I Want A Hippopotamus for Christmas
3.(Everybody’s Waitin’ For) The Man With The Bag feat. Adam Lambert
4.St. Patrick’s Day
5.River
6.Welcome Home
7.All Those Christmas Clichés
8.The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)
9.Somewhere In My Memory feat. Evan Rachel Wood
10.Drunk On Christmas feat. Lainey Wilson
11.Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
12.New Year