When I offered to write a review of the first Christmas CD of the year, I immediately wondered if this was a smart thing to do. I don’t care about Christmas and I usually get very disappointed when I have to listen to special Christmas CDs. When I first saw the Sounds Like Christmas, my doubts grew, the artwork of this CD didn’t promise much good.

The December People are a group of musicians gathered around Robert Berry, who is responsible for most of the additional lyrics and music. As an experiment, they posed a musical question. “What if great bands such as Pink Floyd, Yes, Queen, Kansas, ELP and The Beatles all recorded familiar Christmas songs, what would they sound like?” To give this project a (commercial) boost, they invited guest musicians among whom Steve Walsh, John Wetton, Trent Gardner and Mike Baker.

The music on this CD sounds great. The December People have managed to keep the spirit of all the seventies sympho-prog bands alive without literally covering these super groups. There are no weak tracks on this record and the collection of different influences never breaks the unity of the CD. Although I’m rather positive about this release, I doubt if it’ll be a commercial success, especially since this CD was already released by another label in 2001.