David Furst: This is All of It on WNYC. I'm David Furst in for Alison Stewart. Old Crow Medicine Show are stars of the old-time music and bluegrass worlds, but now they are breaking into a new scene, Christmas music.

[MUSIC - OCMS: Breakin’ Up Xmas]

David Furst: Oh man, as soon as I hear that screaming, I am in. The album is called OCMS XMAS. That is short for Old Crow Medicine Show Christmas, and it's packed with new songs to add to your holiday playlist. The band is going to be performing at the Bergen Performing Arts Center in Englewood, New Jersey for a Holiday Hootenanny on December 20th. Now joining us for a Listening Party, we are here with band members Ketch Secor, Morgan [pronunciation of Jahnig], and Cory Younts. Thank you very much for being here.

Ketch Secor: Lovely to be here.

David Furst: Season's greetings. [crosstalk] Did I get all of the names correct?

Morgan Jahnig: Just about. It's Morgan Jahnig.

David Furst: Okay. Thank you. Morgan Jahnig. Thank you so much.

Morgan Jahnig: You were so close.

Speaker: So close.

David Furst: So close. [crosstalk]

Morgan Jahnig: No worries.

David Furst: Now, this is not your first foray into Christmas music, right? You released a single a few years ago. Why was this the time to come back to holiday music?

Ketch Secor: Well, we live in Nashville, Tennessee, and every country [unintelligible 00:01:32] has got to put out a Christmas record, but we waited a really long time to put ours out because we put so much love and intention behind it because we just love this holiday season.

David Furst: If you're putting a lot of love and intention behind it, I guess that means you're writing a lot of original material. This is not a collection that just hits all of the classics.

Ketch Secor: No, it's primarily a brand new Christmas type of record with lots of songs about the experience, the joys, the highs, the lows, the crushing defeats of not getting what you want the day after Christmas, missing your loved ones, fighting over eggnog recipes. It's the whole gamut, David.

David Furst: I want to come back to the Day After Christmas because I think that is a future classic that's on the album, but I want to start by talking about the piece we just heard that kicks off the album, Breakin’ Up Xmas. We heard just a bit of it. It's listed as a traditional. It has something to do with old Christmas day. Can someone explain what that is?

Ketch Secor: Sure. This is a tradition in the hills of Appalachia in Western North Carolina where the Breaking Up Christmas Party was the day after Christmas, and you got the tree and you chucked it out into the yard and you set it on fire and everybody drank corn whiskey and had a big, big frolic. I think it's sort of follows a little bit more of the earlier calendar of Christianity.

David Furst: I see. Morgan, when you're getting to play a rave-up like that, does that just get the Christmas spirit going?

Morgan Jahnig: We've been playing that song, I think, about as long as I've been in this band. That's an old one. I don't think there was any doubt in our minds that we would take something from the roots of what we did and the roots of Christmas itself here in America and start the record with it.

David Furst: Cory, can we hear-- We're going to get to some more music, but can you talk about Krampus Night?

Cory Younts: Krampus Night. Well, this is another one that--

David Furst: This is that demon from the Alps, right?

Cory Younts: This is the demon [crosstalk]

David Furst: Really scary-looking- [crosstalk]

Cory Younts: Scandinavian. Really this ought to be your question, really, Yonig.

[laughter]

Cory Younts: No. What is this song about?

Morgan Jahnig: It's how-- Everything needs its counterpoint.

David Furst: There's Santa.

Morgan Jahnig: Yes, there's Santa bringing the good kids presents, and then of course, it's not coal anymore, or there [unintelligible 00:03:57] in the beginning. Now we've got this scary figure named Krampus with horns.

Cory Younts: He essentially comes around to terrify the children at Christmas--

Morgan Jahnig: And throw them in a sack and take them away.

David Furst: Okay, [chuckles] okay. What was it about Krampus that made you have to write a song about?

Ketch Secor: Well, I wrote this one, and I just thought it'd be cool to have a spooky Christmas song. So much about Christmas material is all about the joy and all the fun and the ho-ho and all that, but what if there was a Christmas song that was about the evil that lurks this time of year? It's got a line, "All the good children, off with your heads."

Morgan Jahnig: "Off with your heads."

Cory Younts: "Off with your heads."

David Furst: All right. Well, let's hear a little bit. This is Krampus Night.

[MUSIC - OCMS: Krampus Night]

[song plays]

Krampus coming, slithering by

Krampus coming and slithering by

Making all the little children cry

On the Krampus night

He's a mean old goat with horns on his head

Mean old goat with horns on his head

Watch out, he don't kill you dead

On the Krampus night

[song ends]

David Furst: Oh man, look out. I'm already scared. Do you have any unique Christmas traditions? Perhaps Old Crow Medicine Show Christmas traditions?

Ketch Secor: Well, our big holiday caper is, for the past about 17 or 18 years, we've been ringing in the new year from what's called the Mother Church of Country Music. It's The Ryman Auditorium, which formerly housed the Grand Ole Opry, but it's been a performance space in Nashville, Tennessee for about 130 years. This time of year is really when Old Crow starts suiting up and getting ready to do our sort of Dick Clark show and a ton of special guests.

It's been very interesting to have this new tradition that we're just loving of going out on the road playing Christmas music all across the country and getting to involve children's choirs in all of these communities. We've been able to meet young people from the Ozarks all the way up to, well, Jersey, like you mentioned, this Saturday night. It's really a joy to get to sing with young people and to bring them into the fold.

David Furst: Are you touring with this group of singers, or you're playing with a different choir in each community?

Ketch Secor: Right. They come out every night from the local area, and so we get to learn a little bit about what's in the repertoire, we get to meet their folks, and really what we get to do is all sing together.

David Furst: Very nice. The name of the new holiday album is OCMS XMAS, and maybe this is somebody else's problem, but how would you guys describe the Old Crow Medicine Show sound and the music that you play?

Morgan Jahnig: I think that throughout our years, we've had a lot of people try to say a lot of different ways that we play music, but I remember we landed kind of at one point, is that we played American roots music. I think that's something that-- This was before Americana was a word that meant anything other than the the buildings along Route 66.

?Speaker: Before that became a music category.

Morgan Jahnig: Yes. I think when we look at American roots music, that comes from all of the different music that was born out of America, like the blues and like rock and roll, but then you've also got all the great traditions of all the people who brought their music here with them. There's a little bit of conjunto, and there's Old-Time, and there's bluegrass, and there's country, and there's jazz. There's just everything that kind of comes through the American tapestry, is stuff that we like getting our hooks into.

David Furst: Ketch, how is writing a Christmas song different from writing any other Old Crow Medicine Show song, or is it different?

Ketch Secor: Well, it's really an adjacent genre to what we already do. It's not that far off because we play acoustic music. When you have mandolins in your band, like mandolins sound like Christmas music already. The plink of a banjo has this wonder campfire kind of glow to it, which is very Christmas adjacent. Then being country musicians, like we are out of Nashville, we sing a lot about family and group dynamics, group singing, and the whole nature of harmony singing is also very Christmas adjacent, so it becomes a little easier for us as an old-time string band to apply what we already do to the sounds of the season because they tend to already-- you just got to add a little glockenspiel.

David Furst: [laughs] It's just a little push.

Ketch Secor: And just jingle them jingle bells.

Morgan Jahnig: I know, just instead of the tambourine, it's jingle bells.

David Furst: Oh, that's all it is, right?

Morgan Jahnig: Pretty much.

David Furst: The tambourine for jingle bells in your set.

Morgan Jahnig: Yes, yes. Piano for glockenspiel and maybe get a little tin whistle in there.

David Furst: There are so many beloved Christmas songs though. Cory, is it daunting to enter that world yourself? It's hard to make a mark.

Cory Younts: Sure. Yes. It's been a blast doing this whole tour. Again, what Ketch was saying earlier, how we normally this time of year aren't on the road, and so it is a new tour, it's a new sound in a way for us. We're not really on autopilot at the moment. I'm sure we will be years down the line with this tour, but it's been really fun.

Morgan Jahnig: It's a new fresh thing.

Cory Younts: A new fresh thing.

David Furst: I want to hear a little more music right now. Speaking of Christmas classics, you do cover John Lennon's Happy Xmas (War Is Over) on this new collection. Let's go ahead and listen to a little bit of that right now.

[MUSIC - OCMS: Happy Xmas (War Is Over)]

[song plays]

So, this is Christmas

And what have you done?

Another year over

A new one just begun

So, this is Christmas

I hope you had fun

The near and the dear ones

The old and the young

A very merry Christmas

And a happy New Year

Let's hope it's a good one

Without any fear

So, this is Christmas

For weak and for strong--

[song ends]

David Furst: Listening to the trilling there. I was thinking about what you were just saying about the instrumentation. It really lends itself to this piece.

Ketch Secor: Yes. This song was recorded first in New York City by John and Yoko and included this wonderful Harlem Youth Choir who-- We all-- This song is such a powerful one. I think of the advocacy for peace at this time of year is, it's brighter, more vibrant, and possibly even better heated than at any other time of the year. We think about peace, we act about peace. Yoko reminds us that peace is something that you have to give of yourself. I just love there's a New York connection here. There's a need for us to be talking about peace. When we're out there singing it with children, as we do,--

David Furst: Because you get to perform this with a choir each night, right?

Ketch Secor: Yes. We had the kids from my children's school sing on this record.

David Furst: You can hear them at the end of the piece.

Ketch Secor: Yes.

Cory Younts: Yes.

Ketch Secor: Young and old. This is our message. It's one of peace and making the active statement of peace. It's not enough just to think it. You got to go do it.

David Furst: It's beautiful. This is a song that's been covered many times. Is this one where you're thinking, "I really want to put our own spin on it," or is it just one that, "Hey, let's just do this in a faithful way with our instrumentation"?

Ketch Secor: Just want to have this be our message. This is the bumper sticker on the back of my sleigh.

David Furst: [laughs] I like that, the bumper sticker. Well, we are here in a Listening Party with Old Crow Medicine Show for their holiday album OCMS XMAS. We're going to continue this conversation in just a moment here on WNYC. It's All of It.

[music]

David Furst: It's All of It on WNYC. I'm David Furst in for Alison Stewart, and we are having a Listening Party with Old Crow Medicine Show. Their new holiday album is OCMS XMAS. They're going to be at Bergen Performing Arts Center on December 20th in Englewood, New Jersey, and I wanted to get to one of the-- what I think is a real future classic on this collection. This is a fantastic song about the day after Christmas, December 26th.

Ketch Secor: Well, yes, this is a really fun tune. We love playing this. It celebrates the deluge of wrapping paper and all the kids who got what they wanted and the tears of those who didn't. A little bit of everything.

David Furst: If you can't corner the Christmas market, you could probably own the 26th. Right?

Ketch Secor: Boxing Day, here we come.

David Furst: [laughs] Well, let's hear a little bit. This is Old Crow Medicine Show, December 26th.

[MUSIC - OCMS: December 26th]

[song plays]

Well, another year has come and gone

We sang the songs and drunk the nog

The twinkle lights are staying on

All day, fa, la, la

The fridge is full of Christmas goose

And needles dropping off the spruce

The ornaments are getting loose

And falling, fa, la, la

It's time to throw away the tree

Clear out the opening debris

It's far too soon, don't you agree?

Hang on, fa, la, la

The relatives pack up the car

And follow back the Evening Star

With heavy bags and heavy hearts

Because it's the day after Christmas

And we gotta wait a wholе dang year

For the holly and garland and elvеs on shelves

The sleigh and the bells and the pine tree smells

Don't wanna listen to the fading sounds of reindeer

'Cause it's the day after Christmas

And we ain't out of cheer

[song ends]

David Furst: Not out of cheer just yet. You got to make your own fun on the day after Christmas, right?

Ketch Secor: Absolutely.

Morgan Jahnig: Yes. I think that everybody has got that wistfulness as soon as midnight strikes on December 26th, and you've got all the wrapping paper still on the floor, and you've got all that leftover food in the fridge, and everybody's gone and the house is a wreck, and all you kind of want to do is get back there again to that morning the next year.

David Furst: Well, "Crank this up and bring it back."

Morgan Jahnig: Yes.

David Furst: Okay. The name of the new album, OCMS XMAS. We're here with members of Old Crow Medicine Show, Morgan Jahnig, Cory Younts, and Ketch Secor. You are on tour right now. I mentioned you're going to be at the Bergen Performing Arts Center in Englewood, New Jersey on December 20th for a Holiday Hootenanny. What can we expect at this show? What happens at a Holiday Hootenanny?

Ketch Secor: There's a lot of Christmas music and some revelry, and there's also some funny Christmas gags. There is present wrapping, kind of 101. There's-

Cory Younts: Trees, there's a screen behind us that's showing a bunch of Christmas images.

David Furst: Did you say there's Christmas wrapping? Are you wrapping presents for--

Speaker: Yes, I--

David Furst: It's just wrapping the merch in the lobby? Like what are we talking about? [crosstalk]

Ketch Secor: There's lines wrapping around the building to catch up and get your picture made with everybody. During the show, there's one point that I really love where I say, "All right, everyone gather out at story time. I love those Christmas stories. Let's all gather around the fire." Cory, give me some musical underscoring that Cory launches into--.

[Cory gives underscoring]

Ketch Secor: I'm like, "No, no, no, come on, Cory. That's too peppy, man. This is a more emotional story than that." Then he says--

Cory Younts: Let me give a little whistle Greensleeves.

[Cory whistles Greensleeves]

Ketch Secor: Then he says, "Call me Schroeder."

Cory Younts: Oh, yes. I missed my line.

Ketch Secor: See, I told you it's a new show. We're [crosstalk]. He's working out the kinks.

?Speaker: The script supervisor out.

Ketch Secor: By the 20th, that line is going to be down.

Cory Younts: Oh, yes.

Morgan Jahnig: Oh, yes.

Ketch Secor: Then they break into Greensleeves, and then it gets real somber, and I begin to tell a very Garrison Keillor type of radio drama story all about the Christmas parade and who is aboard.

David Furst: What was the vibe that you wanted to capture with this new album? Is there a particular feeling you wanted to conjure when you imagine people listening to this on the 25th or the 26th?

Ketch Secor: On the cover of it, it says, "To y'all from us or something like that." I feel like, even though Nashville has changed an awful lot, and guys, listeners, there you got some major airports, and they all got major non-stops to Music City, USA, so come on down and check it out for yourselves, but know that when you get to Nashville, it's not what it was, and we're from what it was. I feel like this is a bit of a Christmas card from the place formerly known as Nashville, Tennessee before it sort of became, well,--

David Furst: Yes. Well, let's talk about that. What is it now, and what are you imagining that it was or that you're imagining?

Ketch Secor: Now it's like Las Vegas. What it was, was a community full of wonderful, odd characters who made a great big pageantry of the holidays and country music and of all the things that we did were the essence of the South.

David Furst: You're still there. It seems there still is, though, a community in Nashville.

Ketch Secor: Very much so, but what the general public finds when they get off the Spirit Airlines flight from JFK for $69, is a party town. It's just like revelry all the time. When you go to visit New Orleans and you get drunk in the first 24 hours and then you're home by the next 36, a couple of Po' Boys later and a little Étouffée is all it took. Nashville is a little bit like that. Like go pop a couple of hot chicken slices.

?Speaker: Chicken slices, yes.

?Speaker: [unintelligible 00:18:50].

?Speaker: Some $8 beers.

Ketch Secor: Yes, go to the Grand Ole Opry and then you come on home. We want you to stick around. We want you to sit down, eat with us, hang out on the street corner with us. We love our town. We want you to know what makes it tick. This record has a little bit of component of that. This is what our Christmas party is like in Nashville.

David Furst: Well, that sounds like a great holiday invitation and a great way to frame the music on this collection. Around the holidays, people start tuning their dials in to that Christmas music. It's a huge market. Do you hope you'll find a way into that for Old Crow Medicine Show?

Ketch Secor: We've been a band for 27 years now, since 1998 is when our band started. It's been quite a while now, and so making a Christmas record is kind of like plotting out the next decade of "What do you want to do in December, guys?" "What should we start doing after Thanksgiving?" "I know, let's go out on the road and delight people." When you make Christmas music, it's like you got a fifth Beatle in your band. It's like having Santa in the act. Everybody already loves the holidays.

David Furst: Interesting.

Ketch Secor: Then there's so many touchstones to the music too. This is also a time of tremendous loss for people. It's a time where we miss the past, it's a nostalgic time, but it could also be a time of lonesomeness and sorrow. That's where country music comes in because country music is always there to champion the hard working folk.

Cory Younts: Well, there's a lot of great sad holiday music too, Blue Christmas and missing people who are away.

Ketch Secor: We're especially mindful of our family members who are deployed, who might be out serving the nation in far-flung lands. Music has this way of connecting us to the source. Particularly when you're playing roots music like we do, not only is it the source, like, let's say you're stationed abroad and you're listening to Christmas music, makes you feel like you're at home again. The actual music itself is from the headwaters of our American sounds and our traditions. When you play the clawhammer banjo, that's an instrument come from West Africa, and it met the fiddle from the British Isles and Scotland and the Highlands, these are the sounds of us.

David Furst: Just wrapping up here. What are you thinking about for your Christmas plans? How do you plan to celebrate?

Morgan Jahnig: Well, I've got my sister who just lives about, I don't know, 10 minutes from here up on 14th Street. Christmas is always a time, one of the few times where we all get to come together in one place. We all-- My folks are down in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and so everybody, always, every year, I don't think we've missed a Christmas where we're not all together. That's what I look forward to.

David Furst: Any other plans?

Cory Younts: Oh, my family is in Little Rock, Arkansas, and we love to wait to the last minute to come up with what we're going to do. Fight over recipes.

David Furst: [laughs] I relate to that plan.

Cory Younts: There you go. Right. Then we hug and love on each other with a little eggnog and everything's fine and we're all family again.

Ketch Secor: I just got engaged,-

David Furst: Congratulations.

Ketch Secor: -so I'm going to go to my fiancée family farm up in the land of Lincoln and see some of this big snow.

David Furst: Well, let's go out on one more song. This one is called North By Northeast. What can you tell us about this one?

Ketch Secor: Well, the Christmas holidays up here in the Mid-Atlantic region and especially going further down east towards, New England, is really, it's when you're experiencing the snow globe effect. It's all around you. The colors, the lights, the smells, the bells. Oh, it's the holly Jolliest time of year, and especially when you're up north.

David Furst: Okay, this is North by Northeast. Band members Ketch Secor, Morgan Jahnig, and Cory Younts from Old Crow Medicine Show. The new album is OCMS XMAS, Old Crow Medicine Show Christmas. Thank you so much for joining us today, and happy holidays.

Morgan Jahnig: Merry Christmas.

Ketch Secor: Thanks, David. Thanks, WNYC.