It’s just about that time of year again! A blanket of white covers the scenery, school and work gets canceled, retail stores everywhere get a little more hectic and everyone just seems to have a little more joy. Various traditions have been established in keeping with the mood of Christmas time, from TBS airing
A Christmas Story to your town being seasoned with an array of lights and decorations to bands and artists releasing music specially for the holiday. When post-hardcore giants Thrice’s frontman Dustin Kensrue opted to venture out into a solo career, his folk-rock debut
Please Home Come proved he was versatile enough to take a stab at music that was centrally acoustic; his raspy voice fit quite naturally with the dry nature of an acoustic guitar and bluesy rhythms and it was enough to garner a generally warm reception. Kensrue’s voice and laid back attitude make a return this Christmas, and the results are mixed, but never bad.
The idea of Kensrue crooning Christmas tunes doesn’t necessarily sound like a bad idea on paper, at least to me, but it doesn’t really excite me either. The Earth volume of the latest
Alchemy Index installment was enough for some, so if you didn’t like that disc there’s no chance this will appeal to you as it is even more stripped down and bare. If you’ve heard
Please Come Home you have a good idea of what to expect here, except that most of the songs are covers, so what we’re left with is Christmas classics being translated with Kensrue’s voice and guitar. Some of the well-known covers aren’t too much different than the way you’ve always heard them, like “O Holy Night”, the album’s best song far and away. It’s when Kensrue relies too much on himself that the songs fall flat; his voice does not mesh well with the intended mood of the songs and it comes off as awkward more than anything else. I found it very difficult to stomach some of these songs, particularly “Blue Christmas”. It’s not because they’re bad, it’s that the vocals clash with the music a good deal of the time, making good songs a chore to listen to. This is especially bad because these songs are intended to be relaxing and cheerful.
He does pull off a couple originals well however; it’s hard to resist the slightly odd nature of “This Is War” or the homey charm of the title track. “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” is another example of Kensrue’s voice working fine with the music. What exactly determines whether or not his voice works with any given song is something I can’t answer, but I’d say it has something to do with how far Kensrue has to get out of his comfort zone to be somewhat faithful to the original song; it’s pretty easy to see he’s a natural fit for simple little folk songs, but classic Christmas songs like these don’t always translate well into that. I wouldn’t go as far as to say he butchers the songs, but I definitely wouldn’t say I prefer them over the originals or other versions I’ve heard. The aforementioned “O Holy Night” and “Christmas Blues” are the tracks I enjoyed the most, probably because they’re a timeless classic that he emulates perfectly, and something that would be right at home on his last album, respectively.
Whether or not you should get this album depends on a few very simple things. In theory, if you like his voice and the acoustic side of Thrice as well as his last album, this one should bear similar results. However, all of those things apply to me, but I found
The Good Night is Still Everywhere to be quite lackluster about half the time. Once again, it’s not that the songs are bad or outright boring (though some have that tendency), it’s that Kensrue’s voice is now probably one of the last things I’d want fronting a Christmas song regardless of how much I like it in its own merit. Chances are if you’re interested enough to buy this album in the fist place, there really is no reason you’d be disappointed because you get pretty much exactly what you expect. As a Christmas album, however, it simply does not stand out amidst the countless other albums of the same purpose, aside from a few songs. That doesn’t really matter, though, when all you want is to enjoy some background Christmas music and embrace the season.
