There’s a particular kind of joy that comes from hearing Christmas music played loud, loose,
and with a wink – and that’s exactly where Toronto blues-rock band 5 Neat Guys thrive on their new album, PLAY CHRISTMAS MUSIC!!. Blending vintage rock ’n’ roll swagger with festive nostalgia and a healthy dose of humour, the band’s second holiday release feels less like background music and more like the soundtrack to a living room in motion. From a riotous reimagining of “Silent Night” to moments that balance heart, grit, and sheer fun, the album captures the spirit of a band that doesn’t take itself too seriously. We spoke with 5 Neat Guys about the long road to this record, the inside joke that became its title, and why Christmas songs are best enjoyed with the volume turned up.
PLAY CHRISTMAS MUSIC!! is your second holiday album – what made now the right time to return to Christmas music, and how does this one differ from your first festive release?
Ed: We’ve actually been planning this for about three years! The plan had been to do a Blues album, and then a Christmas album in quick succession, but time got the better of us! We had partially finished the Blues album, but since we are often asked to play at various holiday season events, we set the Blues album aside to get another Christmas album in the bag. We wanted to delight our audiences with some new Christmas songs!
Doug: Plus, we all love the holiday season and the fun music that goes along with it!
You’ve described your version of “Silent Night”as anything but silent. What inspired the decision to give such a classic carol a rowdy, vintage rock-’n’-roll makeover?
Ed: You’re right, it’s traditionally a slow and quiet song! When we were looking at what songs we wanted to have on the album, we wanted to make sure that some familiar classics were in the mix, and so “Silent Night” came up. So we asked ourselves, “How can we give something written in 1816 a rock or blues edge?”
Doug: And the answer is: You make the traditional 3-beat into a 4-beat. Once that happened, it took on this boogie-woogie, back-to-basics rock ‘n roll song. The chord structures are all there – there’s a garage rock song that lives underneath a lot of those old classics. Once we heard it that way, we couldn’t go back!
The album was recorded over nearly a year, from drum tracking in November 2024 to finishing vocals on a warm August evening. What were some of the most memorable moments from that marathon recording process?
Doug: Bringing in the tubular bells to the studio, and just playing around with those, that was a blast to be able to have such an unusual instrument on site. It’s dang heavy though! It went up and down the stairs several times when we played various gigs to launch the album.
Andrewes: One funny memory for me was coming into the studio to record one note on the bass. After most of the recording was done, there was one bit of “Please Come Home For Christmas” that was sticking out, and we realized I’d played a G instead of an A. So I came in, played one note, and went back home!
Ed: A really special moment for me was seeing my two daughters being able to contribute to the album. Eve added a real sweetness to “Unwrap You At Christmas,” and Clare added some awesome trumpet lines to “Silent Night,” and then both threw in various background vocals that really gave a richness to the final product. Doug’s daughter, Amanda, joined us on stage for some backups, too, so it was a really family affair!
A full set of tubular bells made its way into the studio for this record – what other surprising instruments, ideas, or experiments helped give the album its unique holiday charm?
Ed: So, 3 years ago, our original drummer left to focus on his own indie band (TANDM), and in walked Stephen Edwards. Well, it turns out that Stephen is a multi-instrumentalist, and so we just gave him a blank slate to add to the songs. So he threw in some great sax and bari-sax lines to “Reindeer Blues” (along with Clare’s trumpet), giving it this real “wall-of-horns” sound, like a James Brown song. He added some baritone guitar to “Feliz Navidad,” and Shawn (lead guitar) worked out how to add a finger slide part in there, too. So yeah, there’s some real new growth for us in this album. Some bigger, broader sounds than previous recordings.
Ed, you mentioned wanting the album to feel like something families could put on while decorating the tree or dancing around the living room. How did you balance the blues, pop/rock, sentimental tunes, and classic Christmas songs to create that all-ages vibe?
Ed: Thanks for noticing! We were really trying to make it a mix of familiar favourites. When we play live, sometimes it’s in bars, and sometimes it’s at an outdoor festival, with young kids and toddlers just bopping around and feeling the beat. So we wanted to give something that the kids would love just as much as anyone. There were other kid-classics that we had slated, too, but that we just couldn’t get done in time – Frosty, Rudolph. But who knows, maybe we’ll do a 3rd Christmas release someday??
The album title came from a note you once received that simply said “PLAY CHRISTMAS MUSIC!!”. Can you take us back to that moment and share why that phrase became such a defining part of the band’s identity?
Ed: We had been booked to play three hour-long sets at a Christmas-themed event, but, at the time, we only had about 30 minutes of Christmas songs in our repertoire. We asked our booking agent, “Are you sure? We’ll have to play some rock or blues to fill in the gap,” and it was not going to be a problem – so we thought!
Stephen: We got into our first set, we were doing a full-glam, all-out rendition of Bowie’s “Moonage Daydream,” and the event organizer, with a stern face, handed me a note that said in block letters “PLAY CHRISTMAS MUSIC!!” So we just cycled through the songs we had. The audience was probably a bit confused! <laughing>
Ed: When we were chatting later, the band took it as a challenge. We said, “Ya, ok, we’ll learn some more Christmas songs for next year, we’ll show them!!” And then someone said, “Ya, and we’ll make an album!” And then we said, “And we’ll call itPLAY CHRISTMAS MUSIC!” So at first it was just an inside joke, but then we said, wait, why not??
There’s a lot of humour woven into the album, including the legendary improvised mouth-trumpet solo on “Unwrap You At Christmas.”Do you find comedy naturally works its way into your creative process, or is it something you lean into intentionally as a band?
Doug: We have a lot of fun together, we are always kidding around and cracking jokes. So much so that Stephen has even perfected the rim-shot, which then makes us laugh harder. Recently, while practicing in the studio, one of our inside jokes has been to end each song with a musical “cha-cha-cha” ending. So, I guess we never really take anything too seriously! Hmmm, maybe that seeps into the music? (Shawn gives an exaggerated shrug, chuckling)