Beth // James photos by Madeleine Northway
Beth // James Share The Joy of Their Christmas at The Burchills EP
Austin-based duo Beth // James consists of duo and life partners Mikaela and Jordan Burchill and they have recently released a new holiday-themed EP, Christmas at the Burchills. It marks their first foray into releasing holiday music, but builds on many years of performing seasonal songs together. Writing Christmas songs is notoriously tricky with the wealth of songs already recorded, released, and with particular classics played on repeat during the holiday at home and in public venues.
But that didn’t hold Beth // James back at all. Having been inspired to write a couple of songs last year, they came back even stronger and penned several more, as well as rolling in a cover of Elvis’ “Blue Christmas,” a song that holds a particular place in their hearts. With an inventive attitude towards the music, a willingness to explore their personal emotions, and with a sprinkling of witty observations, the Burchills make a very winning contribution to our seasonal experience with this new EP. I spoke to them about taking on such an ambitious project and why they found it a particularly fun experience.
Americana Highways: I feel like writing one Christmas song poses challenges, so deciding to create a whole EP is definitely an undertaking. Were you not daunted by that idea?
Mikaela: It was thrilling! I think we just got really inspired to write, and that once we dove into writing in the Christmas realm, it was easy to keep going. We did have a few that we wrote in the previous year that we brought to the project, but we did write three of them in a short period of time. It was really fun.
Jordan: It was also fun having a topic that we had to write about. I love the creativity of writing, but sometimes you can wonder what you’re talking about. Knowing that we had to write about Christmas was actually a lot of fun.
Mikaela: I felt like it kind of took the pressure off to be writing about Christmas because it’s all been said and done. So all that’s left is to have fun with it and put your own spin on it.
AH: But I can see discarding all that weight and writing from a very personal place. I feel like that’s what you did here and the idiosyncratic part of it is what makes it appealing. You also have a sense of humor about yourselves and about the music, clearly. Do you think humor is part of Christmas music?
Mikaela: I think it kind of is, or at least a lightness to things. If you think about “Holly Jolly Christmas” or “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas.” There’s a joyfulness in not taking things too seriously. I’ve always been drawn to that in songs. It’s also important not to take yourself too seriously in any songwriting.
Jordan: I was just thinking of those songs. I also think that sometimes you’re allowed to do it at Christmas more.
AH: That makes me think of what we allow ourselves at Christmas that we might not allow ourselves the rest of the year. It is that childlike glee in little things that make us happy. Expressing that is allowed more at Christmas. I think some of the humor comes from adults continuing to sing children’s songs and realizing how weird traditional songs often are.
Mikaela: This has gotten me thinking, not to go too far into therapy world, but I think writing this EP has been really helpful for my inner child. I used to be a choir girl when I was a kid, and we did all these Christmas shows. It was a huge part of my childhood. We’d be dressed up in sequins and weird stuff. I think, in a way, this was letting myself go back into choir Mikaela mode and write about that.
Jordan: Now that we’re talking about this, I want to write more Christmas songs! I love my family, but I want to write about not wanting to go to my family for Christmas. I feel like those Christmas songs aren’t out there. Maybe you don’t want to talk to your uncle or second cousin, you know? [Laughs] I feel like that song hasn’t been written yet.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=xEM9pJQ04jQ%3Fsi%3D1PPRL-bwzxS0kji-
AH: I feel like there might be a little of a suggestion of that in “Marfa Christmas Lights” or maybe I was just seeing it there because that’s how I feel, too. You get that expansiveness, there aren’t people all around. But you’re right, a lot of Christmas songs are about gathering around people you care about or wanting to be there. Is Marfa a post-Christmas get away for you?
Mikaela: Yes, we go in January, and it’s our wedding anniversary in January. That’s our safe haven, where there’s so much high energy during the holidays, then it’s our break-time and we go to Marfa. There’s nothing there. It’s amazing.
Jordan: We liked the thought of, “What if we did that on Christmas? What would that be like?”
Mikaela: We were also thinking, “We like to use this as our getaway. What if after Christmas, Santa’s done delivering presents, and that’s where he likes to go. He just goes to a bar.”
Jordan: And he has a drink.
Mikaela: He doesn’t talk to anybody!
AH: I saw a prominent newscaster recently commenting on the reality that nearly everything we see in the news and online surrounding Christmas is about selling us things. That’s just the way it is, even for small businesses who make a lot of their yearly sales during this time. So your song made me think of that, too. Marfa isn’t selling itself to people as a Christmas destination.
Jordan: I really like that idea. You should go to Marfa someday, because it’s not selling you anything!
Mikaela: There are literally signs on shops saying, “I’m gone all day. Text me if you want. Maybe I’ll come back.” [Laughs] It’s very funny.
AH: I’m sure whoever hears the song will think of places they’ve seen that are like this, that are like, “Take it or leave it.” But you’ll benefit from going there. For that song, how did the sound come together?
Mikaela: Our lyrics and music usually come together.
Jordan: That was the last song we wrote on this album because we knew that we needed one more song. I love how that song happened because it was kind of like magic. It happened that quick.
Mikaela: We sat down and wrote it in a half hour or so.
Jordan: We write all the time, and we do co-writes and sometimes you can get bogged down trying to find something that you like. But with this deadline, knowing we were going into the studio in three days, it was very organic. Words and music came all together.
Mikaela: We knew that we wanted one for Jordan to sing lead on since I sang lead on the other songs, too.
AH: Now that I know that, I can see how it all fits together with “Marfa Christmas Lights” as a nice last word for the collection. It sums things up. I’m now wondering when you had to film the videos for all these songs. Was it in the summertime?
Mikaela: [Laughs] Yes, it was in the summertime and it was very hot in Texas! That was not the most comfortable thing. We had the fans going, and we were in those sweaters.
Jordan: We filmed them at a friend’s house because it’s a very cool house, but the air conditioning sucked during that time!
https://youtube.com/watch?v=VYr0U2-igBs%3Fsi%3D6JLIJPvJ4J0ZtGNj
AH: It has a great retro look that kind of works for vintage nostalgia Christmas, with the wood paneling.
Mikaela: We did the videos there, aside from the tiki video, and we also did the photos there.
AH: I want to call out the amazing Reindeer poodle skirt that you wear in the “Santa Won’t You Deliver” video, Mikaela. That’s outstanding.
Mikaela: Thank you! And the nose lights up. It was the only one I could find, and I had to take it in to be altered, but it was the summer. There were lots of people there, saying, “What are you doing? What’s that for??”
AH: That song, “Santa Won’t You Deliver” is so classic. It has an early rock ‘n roll sound. I’m sure you’re calling up Christmas traditions, like Elvis songs, but also that early rock.
Jordan: We were definitely listening to those classic songs.
Mikaela: It’s like “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” “Jingle Bell Rock” and “Blue Christmas.” That’s not a style we typically write in, actually.
Jordan: I love playing the guitar, so that was a lot of fun for me.
AH: It’s a real rocker. I think it’s neat that the song has this style to it, but when I look at the lyrics, they are quite meaningful. They are genuinely about the little things that are significant in a relationship. It’s a real love song.
Mikaela: Yes, it’s a love song! We just had fun writing these songs, and I think part of that was not overthinking things. For me, that’s a big hurdle, wanting to sound cool or wanting to fit in. For this, we got to throw that all out the window. This song was meaningful to us in that moment.
Jordan: I think we sometimes get bogged down with genre, being told, “You can’t write that way.” But we love all kinds of music. We met at Jazz school. Sometimes we need to be certain things, like Americana, or Folk, but because this was Christmas music, that made it easier to write things.
AH: I’m really happy to hear that. I know that genre and deciding on presentation can cause a lot of stress. It’s great that holiday music breaks down those barriers. You get a free pass. And “Blue Christmas” is actually a song that could interpret in a million ways. It’s so famous. I had already heard three versions of it playing before December 1st this year. What was on our mind about how you wanted to approach it?
Jordan: We’ve been playing Christmas music together for so long, and every season, we play a bunch of background gigs. We had sung that song together for years as a duet.
Mikaela: Yes, and every sort of Christmas song!
Jordan: A couple of years ago, we came up with that arrangement, and I love the little run at the end. We’ve done that for so many years.
AH: So you chose that particular song even after playing and singing it so much? It still appeals to you?
Jordan: Some songs are just so great. Those words are fantastic. I love the vibe that we created with it. We’ve done a million Christmas songs together, but that one just has something special. I love that we do it as a duet and we have cool moments of harmony.
Mikaela: I like the perspective of making that song a duet, since it’s usually just sung from the perspective of one person pining for the other. I thought it was a cool idea to have both people sharing that perspective, both wanting to be together, but maybe there’s some issue where they can’t be together. It’s interesting.
AH: That really appealed to me, too, since I hadn’t really heard a duet version before. It reminded me of the fact that two people can look at the same thing, and yet have seen two different things or perceived different situations. With that song, having two voices suggests that, without even having to change the lyrics. Of course, the vocal delivery raises interesting questions, too, and the audience starts to build a story.
Jordan: You can go down a whole rabbit hole about that!
AH: You left a great platform there for guitar playing, too. Had you developed that aspect of the song before, too?
Jordan: Yes, I got to play some guitar on this!
Mikaela: I think when we were creating this, we decided to make all the solos guitar. We thought about having a saxophone, but decided, “No, let’s let Jordan explore that Christmas character in each of these.” I know that for that one, Jordan, you wanted a Willie Nelson feel, with a nylon guitar solo. I had fun listening to it too!
Jordan: I feel like in a lot of our previous releases, I’ve gotten a couple of guitar solos on our records. But I play guitar for a living for other people, so it’s fun to get to actually do it for me. Another thing is that Christmas is a time when instrumental music is actually cool. It’s cool to have Jazz or a sax solo. So it was fun to play instrumental parts.
AH: There’s so much more jazz at Christmas, it’s true! I know people who only play jazz at Christmas, and work in other genres the rest of the year.
Thanks very much for chatting with us, Beth // James. You can find more details and music by Beth // James on their website here: https://www.bethjamesband.com/
Enjoy our previous coverage here: REVIEW: Beth // James “Get Together”
