While Mariah Carey would like to believe she’ll hold the monopoly on Christmas forever (as Dean Martin also probably thought he would), it doesn’t mean other singers aren’t still throwing their own original compositions into the hat in time for the holiday season. The most recent being Sabrina Claudio with the dulcet tones of “Warm December” from her album, Christmas Blues. Accompanied by a video that blends a classic feel with a sultry lounge singer one, our first glimpse of Claudio is a gloved arm from behind a red velvet curtain.
She then reveals a leg, followed by her entire jewel-encrusted bedecked body, appearing in a black gown with mesh cutouts not unlike the catsuit Miley Cyrus recently wore to the iHeartRadio Music Festival back in September to irritatingly sing Blondie’s “Heart of Glass.” Her array of “iced out” looks don’t stop there as we find Claudio serenely seated in a sleigh framed by two giant candy canes (not innuendo-laden at all). Appearing now in a Marilyn Monroe wig with oversized white earmuffs and an icy blue corset with a jeweled bra featuring a pair of shiny diamond snowflakes where the tits ought to be, Claudio suggestively sings, “As we cuddle up next to the fireplace/We’ll be burnin’ up our own flames/Hangin’ like a thousand mistletoes/So I can kiss you everywhere you go.” Eat your heart out, Mariah–ain’t no “puppy love” emotions here. And yes, in many ways, Claudio is giving a much needed update and breath of fresh air to a last gasp Christmas canon the way Mariah was all those years ago in 1994.
Considering Mariah was forced to be buttoned up at that time by her husband/oppressor, Tommy Mottola, there was no way in hell she would have ever appeared in what Claudio shows us in the next scene: a number that amounts to nothing more than a pair of star-shapes on her jugs, with some jeweled string crisscrossed around her belly and a bombastic star crown that Hedy Lamarr would surely approve of. If this weren’t enough of a statement, Claudio is framed inside of a giant Christmas wreath to really play up the “festive” angle.
Expressing a certain “All I Want For Christmas Is You” motif with, “No, I didn’t even make a list this year/’Cause everything I need is all right here,” Claudio brings it back to her lascivious “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” way with, “It might be freezin’ outside/But it’s gonna be a warm December/Makin’ memories to last ’til next November.” Things get progressively strippery during moments when she flashes her pole-ready heels on a dimmed “stage,” of sorts, then later turns her back to us for a stripteasing effect heightened by a triple splitscreen image of her. This “oopsy, I’m so sexual” vibe persists when she pops out of a giant gift-wrapped box in a green corset.
Of course, even with the Prince Jacob-directed “Warm December” video, we would have always detected the sensual tone on the record itself, an eight-track dream (the stuff that snow globes are made of) that commences with “I Just Melt.” Listeners will too as they hear Claudio express what we all like best about the holiday: “Peace on Earth for a moment/Stars set the mood for the night/You and I, we are more than any little thing I could buy.” Which is good, because not many people have extra dough for presents this year. Like a more demure Eartha Kitt on “Santa Baby,” Claudio also croons, “Lovin’ you is my present/Nothing else that I need/In your arms, I’m in Heaven/Wrap me up, baby, please.”
The aptly titled “The Christmas Song” takes the staple that Nat King Cole made famous and slows it down even just a little bit more. There is also a metaness to the line, “Although it’s been said many times, many ways/Merry Christmas to you,” when Claudio sings it to us, as though well-aware that it’s difficult to make Christmas standards fresh again. But that is exactly what she’s done. In a parallel universe, this sound and sultry persona smacks of something Lana Del Rey might have done in the 2012-2013 era when she was in a more “Santa could be my Daddy” phase. Now, instead, she’s trying her hand at “American classics” like, um, “Summertime” from Porgy and Bess for an upcoming album, ostensibly not Christmas-related.
Another original composition, “Christmas Blues,” features The Weeknd sounding particularly Michael Jackson-y–which isn’t necessarily ideal considering Xmas is viewed as an especially pandering time to children. Revamping the sentiment behind “All I Want For Christmas Is You” once more, Claudio and The Weeknd harmonize, “If I didn’t have you when the snow is fallin’/On that winter mornin’/I’d have Christmas blues.” Luckily, it doesn’t seem like anyone will be going anywhere on the upcoming day in question.
Claudio veers back to the familiar favorites of the Christmas oeuvre with “Oh Holy Night.” Delivered with stunning simplicity against a minimalist string arrangement, Claudio also manages to make the quintessential Christmas hit all her own–and even gives Carey’s version a run for its money.
On another original track called “Winter Time,” Claudio joins forces with Alicia Keys as the duo romanticizes their fondness for all things cold weather, gently worshipping, “There’s a storm out there/I would rather die than to leavе your side/Love me through wintеrtimes/And I love this feeling that wintertime gives me/Yeah, I love this feeling that wintertime brings me.” The unimposing guitar instrumentation that goes with it lends a further quality of sweetness to the track.
With an a capella intro to “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas,” Claudio immediately commands your ears’ attention before the piano notes are gradually interwoven into the iconic ditty. A breathy interpretation imbues the track with an ever greater tinge of wistfulness, with Claudio almost lamentingly singing, “Through the years we all will be together/If the fates allow.” This particular line holds even more bittersweet weight in 2020, what with the limitations of travel being a hindrance to many people coming together as they usually do.
Bringing it back to the modern era (at least for the heteronormative), Claudio focuses once more on the “full-time Daddy” angle for “Short Red Silk Lingerie.” In that coquettishly teasing manner, she offers, “No, I didn’t get you that sweater that you need/And no, I didn’t grab you that vintage 23/And no, I didn’t buy us that trip to Italy/Sorry, but the only thing, that’s underneath the tree/Is your really short (short)/Red (red), silk lingerie/That I’m gonna wear all Christmas day.” I’m sure he won’t mind, as it’s still every male’s fantasy to have a significant other that keeps it ho-ish and supplicating.
This original composition transitions perfectly into the equally salacious and aforementioned “Warm December.” Thus, Claudio has managed to do what not many others have been able to with Christmas albums of recent memory: bring the antiquated into the present with relatively few hiccups. Except the ones coming out of Mariah’s mouth as she stands in a state of shock at the potential competition.
