Blake Shelton Offers a Very Country Yuletide Album With Cheers, It's Christmas

Blake Shelton is not an artist I know much about, but based on my first impression of him with the recently released Cheers, It’s Christmas, I would certainly not be opposed to checking out some of his other music. This is an album firmly within the country genre, so that could be a turn-off to some, but for those who enjoy country or are at least open to it, Shelton has created a holiday treasure.

Several of the songs on this album are extra-peppy Christmas classics like the Miranda Lambert duet Jingle Bell Rock, the short, tambourine-laden Winter Wonderland, and Blue Christmas, which is unusually chipper and features a nifty saxophone solo. On the slower side of things are the piano-driven White Christmas, the leisurely Christmas Song and I’ll Be Home for Christmas and the mellow acoustic guitar-driven Silver Bells, a duet with Xenia. Right in between is Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!, which is upbeat but cozy.

Impressively, nearly half of the songs on this album are new or at least not the standard Christmas fare. There’s a New Kid in Town isn’t original to this album, but it is a newer song, and a lovely one at that. This duet with Kelly Clarkson is reverent and slow-paced as it speaks of the wonder of Christ’s arrival. Michael Buble joins Shelton for a Christmasized version of the Canadian crooner’s hit song Home; with just a few adjustments, the mellow ballad becomes such a natural cozy Christmas tune that it seems a wonder it didn’t start out that way.

Oklahoma Christmas is a charming duet with Reba McIntyre. Fiddles add to the down-home feel of this song about longing for an Oklahoma holiday while being stranded in a snowstorm in Tennessee. Time for Me to Come Home, a duet with co-writer Dorothy Shackleford, is romantic in tone, having to do with the yearning to return to a loved one at Christmas. As with Oklahoma, the fiddle really adds to the homey feeling of the track.

On the whimsical end of things, we have the fun Santa’s Got a Choo Choo Train. With fast-paced guitar to simulate the rhythm of the rails and a train whistle as a more overt reminder, it’s an old-fashioned story-song about Santa using a train instead of a sleigh and is one of my favorite tracks. Finally, there’s The Very Best Time of Year, a low-key track he performs with Trypta-Phunk. Its domestic images of comfort radiate general goodwill for all as the album closes.

All told, this is a solid Christmas album with a nice mix of new and classic, sacred and secular. Anyone who doesn’t mind such an unapologetically country album should be able to find something to enjoy here.