Crack

4/20

Mickey Bubbles is having a sharp-jawed, smooth-voiced Christmas party, packed to the rafters with menopausal women visibly swollen with sexual fluid, and we’re all invited! It’s easier to scoff at Bublé on record than when you see him on the telly, when his ludicrously nice face and general charm can send the gruffest of hetrosexual men tumbling to his knees, grappling through the hordes to undo Michael’s flies. But enough of the face-infatuation, because at times this album is actually, physically difficult to listen to.

Christmas songs are something we’re obliged to allow into our lives, but it’s hard to accept these countless albums with the exact same track-listing from a different crooner. How many versions of Santa Baby and It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas do you want? Will you ever be happy? Will this madness never end?

Of course, what Bublé’s done is throw MOR lounge-jazz all over it, giving it a wildly exciting edge worth paying a tenner for. A scat-infused Jingle Bells will send you careering from the room and out of the front door into the snow-dusted front garden screaming and tearing at your own skin, while a duet with who else but Shania Twain on White Christmas is every bit as jarringly horrific as you might expect. Season's greetings.

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Words: Geraint Davies