This Week's Freebie from The 1937 Flood

This week's freebie features a Christmas tune we’re working up for a gig this weekend.

Until the great Rock ’n’ Roll Hall of Famer Charles Brown opened our eyes and ears to the concept, most of us never thought of Christmas as a time for the blues. But then in 1961, King Records released “Charles Brown Sings Christmas Songs” and suddenly Christmas was cool.

The standout track on that album was Brown’s composition called, “Please Come Home for Christmas,” a song that has hit the chart dozens of times since that original release. The Eagles, for example, had a beloved version in the 1970s, Bon Jovi would revisit the tune in the 1990s. Meanwhile, in this century it’s been given fine treatments everyone from Willie Nelson and Martina McBride to Kelly Clarkson.

And now we in The Flood will be incorporating the number into our house band tunes at this weekend’s Route 60 Saturday Night holiday show. Here we are working on our arrangement at last night’s rehearsal. That’s Paul Martin singing lead and Michelle Lewis with her call-and-response harmony. It’s “Please Come Home for Christmas.” Click to hear the tune.

Remember, it’s Route 60 Saturday Night, THIS Saturday night, at Route 60 Music Co., 60 Peyton Street in Barboursville. We have some of the region’s favorite sons as our guests this month, including singer-songwriter Rob McNurlin and the group Blues Crossing, featuring Mike Lyzenga and Ray Hensley. The show starts at 7 p.m. Admission is $5, and this month all proceeds go to help the good work of Facing Hunger Foodbank of Huntington. Come on out for a good time for a good cause.