Just in time for the holidays, the late Jimmy Buffet’s 1996 Christmas album, Christmas Island, is being released on vinyl for the first time.
The album features covers of holiday staples like “Jingle Bells,” “I’ll Be Home For Christmas,” “Up on the House Top” and “Run Rudolph Run” along with the John Lennon classic “Happy Xmas (War is Over).” It also features two originals, “A Sailor’s Christmas” and “Merry Christmas, Alabama (Never Far from Home),” along with the original release’s hidden track, Buffett’s take on “Twas the Night Before Christmas.”
The original album was released on CD, with Buffett sharing in the liner notes that he was a Christmas baby, born on the same day W.C. Fields died. “I think this only goes to prove that God does have a sense of humor,” he noted.
Buffett added, “Christmas Island is a collection of songs, not ladled over with sugary sentimentality and not too far out there in the strange corridors down which my mind sometimes wanders, and I hope it is what you would expect from the Christmas War baby turned island boy born on the day W.C. Fields died.”
Christmas Island will be released December 15 with two vinyl options: standard black and limited edition red. It is available for preorder now.
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