A Christmas Gift for You from Phil Spector (originally released as A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records) is an album of Christmas songs, produced by Phil Spector, and originally released as Philles 4005 in 1963. Spector treated a series of mostly secular Christmas standards to his trademark "Wall of Sound" treatment, and the selections feature the vocal performances of Spector's regular artists during this period. It is one of only twelve long-playing records released on the Philles label, peaking at #13 on the Top Pop Albums chart. The album was reissued by Apple Records in 1972, with different cover art and retitled Phil Spector's Christmas Album; this version went to #6.
However, the album was a relative failure at the time — it was unfortunately released on 22 November 1963, the same day as the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In subsequent years, the album grew in popularity, considered now to be a holiday classic. Several of its tracks became iconic Christmas songs for generations, such as the original (and flop) single "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)," and the well-known "Ring-a-ling-a-ling Ding-dong-ding" background vocals in The Ronettes' "Sleigh Ride." The arrangement of Bruce Springsteen's version of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town" is based in part on the Crystals' version of the song , and U2's late 80s cover of "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" that appeared on the first "A Very Special Christmas" album is patterned after the Darlene Love original that appeared on the Spector LP . The Ronettes version of "Frosty The Snowman" and "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" also usually get some radio airplay during the holiday season .
In 2003, the album was ranked number 142 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. The album has been released several times on different labels: the original release on Philles and the 1972 reissue on Apple ( the issue on Apple, the label owned by the Beatles,probably came as a result of Spector producing LPs for John Lennon and George Harrison and remixing the Beatles last album "Let It Be" and was assumed to have been done as favor to Spector seeing that that the LP hadn't been available in several years , and may have been an "dry run" as a possible, although never followed through, re-release of some of Spector's other out of print Philles label LPs and singles on a possible proposed Spector/Apple label ) were followed by additional reissues on Warner-Spector (1974 - the first version to feature a stereo mix of the songs), Pavilion (1981), Passport (1984), and Rhino (1987). The first CD issue was also on Rhino in 1987, co-credited to Phil Spector International RNCD 70235 and restoring the album's original mono mix. The second CD issue was in 1987 as well, on Chrysalis (CCD 1625) in monophonic for the UK market. This one is co-credited "Spector Records International" and features the slightly different international artwork. The more common third CD issue came in 1989, a remastered release on ABKCO which restored the original title, artwork, and mono mix. The album also appeared as the fourth disc of ABKCO's 1991 Spector box set, Back to Mono, and as the second disc of the 2006 UK-only ABKCO compilation The Phil Spector Collection. As of 2007 both the Back to Mono box and the standalone CD version of A Christmas Gift for You had been taken out of print by ABKCO. Sony Music recently took over distribution rights to the Philles Records catalog and re-released the album on its Legacy Recordings imprint on October 27, 2009.[1]
Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys, well-known as a fan of both the Ronettes and Spector, has cited this album as his favorite album of all time.[2]
Track listing
Recorded at Gold Star recording studio
Personnel
References
