Aural Fixations

MARAH
If You Didn't Laugh, You'd Cry
A Christmas Kind of Town
(Yep Roc)
Well, it's about frickin' time. After a decade of tearing up stages around the world but making albums that never seemed to live up to the on-stage performances, Philadelphia's Marah finally decides to record live in the studio for If You Didn't Laugh, You'd Cry. Coupling the group's raucous, Steve Earle-fronting-the-Stones interplay with the best, most mature set of songs brothers/bandleaders Dave and Serge Bielanko have yet delivered results in an album by turns asskicking ("The Closer," "Poor People") and poignant ("Out of Tune," "Walt Whitman Bridge"). These hardworking rock & roll true believers finally capture most of their live energy on tape (they'll only get all of it once they decide to record and release an actual club date), and it pays off in spades. [buy it]

But that's not all the band has in store for 2005. A Christmas Kind of Town is, as the title indicates, a Christmas record. This is the kind of thing that gets old fast, especially in this age of hipster irony. But Marah pulls it off. Joined by what sounds like a houseful of friends, the band plays it straight on old favorites like "Holly Jolly Christmas," "Silver Bells," "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and an affecting "Christmas Time is Here" (from A Charlie Brown Christmas and one of the most beautiful Xmas tunes ever penned). But the group also includes its own Yuletide originals, from the singalong pop of "New York is a Christmas Kind of Town" and "Christmas With the Snow" to two takes on the rollicking "Counting the Days ('Til Christmas)." The Bielankos offer genuine sentimentality, but balance it with a goofy sense of humor, as on the silly come-on of "Handsome Santa" or when the boys helpfully point out that the activity described in "Here We Come A Wassailing" is a fancy way of saying "Boozing It Up With Friends." Marah and its buddies sound like they're having a grand old time around the tree, and they're happy to welcome company. You probably won't pull A Christmas Kind of Town out any other time of the year, but for it'll bring you home for the holidays. Michael Toland [buy it]