Christmas In Love // Gentleman Auction House

Released in time for Christmas of 2008, this EP was Eric’s attempt to consolidate all of his love of the holiday season into one musical package. A couple songs had already existed in demo form (“On The Rooftop”, and “Christmas In Love”), and the “Here Comes Santa Claus” cover/adaptation had been recorded in the Fall for a potential licensing opportunity, so we decided to hole up at his place and fold it into a pretty little package.

The turnaround was pretty insane for a release that saw ADA distribution (meaning, in stores nationwide), so we were actually forced to submit the tracklist and artwork before the EP was completed – in fact, before some of the songs were even written. “A Banner Year” existed in lyric only. “Home For The Holidays” had been a one-dimensional rollicking shout & shuffle that had seen some live performance in past years, and we had planned to bless it with a much-needed pop overhaul, but really hadn’t figured out yet. And “Don’t Want Another Christmas (Like Last Christmas)” was an exercise in writing a song to fit a song title.

I’ll claim co-producing credits with Eric and Santa, but I can only lay claim to songwriting input on “Home For The Holidays” and “Don’t Want Another Christmas” – two songs which I’m tremendously proud of. That said, I have a special place in my heart for the entire EP – both the joyous whirlwind that was its creation, and the final product that I feel will stand the test of time, even while it sits outside the traditional holiday pop canon.

The artwork was thrown together rather quickly, all things considered. I had an idea for the imagery of two silhouettes in snow globes, but that was about it. I took profile photos of myself and Kiley, my wife, and those became the cover silhouettes. Then I created the rest of the snow globe imagery for the insert pages, including the “His & Hers” headstones for the back of the case. I bought a snow globe at Urban Outfitters that lets you insert your own picture and printed out all the imagery, and I took photos of each image, one at a time, on a light table with a sheet of diffusion used as a cyc (the original idea was to have the background be a subtle gradation of white, but I loved the way the exposure left the cyc as a cool grey). Ultimately, I was quite happy with the result, and only much later did I notice the similarity to Mates of State‘s “Re-Arrange Us“, which came out the same year. Subconscious nick, I promise.