Bob Deakin Short Stories

This Christmas is the only time I’ve ever written a review of one song. It’s been a few years since Wes Lachot wrote and recorded “Christmas Is The Only Time,” which appeared on Christmas Time, an assorted mix of tunes by a collection of singers and bands from the southeastern U.S., but it’s new to me, and will be for a long time.

I loved the melody immediately. It doesn’t sound like a Christmas song as much as it does a mellow rock duet of John Lennon and Brian Wilson with Roger McGuinn on guitar and backing vocals. I thought of the Dan Fogelberg song ‘Same Old Lang Syne’ not long after I heard it as it expresses a melancholy sentiment lodged within a Holiday theme.

Lachot, a multi-instrumentalist/singer/songwriter, now spends most of his time as a recording studio designer and builder, but was for many years an engineer and producer. Steeped into the sounds and musicians of his corner of the country, he came into circles of players such as Mitch Easter, Peter Holsapple, Don Dixon, and others including Chris Stamey, who produced “Christmas Is the Only Time.”

“He’s a great producer,” Lachot said of Stamey from his new home in North Carolina. “I think at one point I credited both Chris and myself as the artists because he had so much input, but on the record he gave the credit to me.”

The song was recorded in 1995 but released for the first time in late 2006. Lachot wrote the song as a sarcastic tribute to his ex-wife not long after their separation.

I’ll never know for sure if we were ever meant to be,
I don’t know if I miss you or I miss the memory

So the line goes.

I was relaxing this past Christmas, listening to my new-found treasure of a Christmas song and turning my girlfriend on to it when she made the following comment: “That’s not really a nice thing he’s saying to this girl is it? That’s the only time he thinks of her?”

I hadn’t noticed the sentiment because I was so taken with the melody but she posed a great question. I decided to find out for myself and liked the song so much that I had a few questions for Wes anyway, so I set out to find him. I quickly found his studio design web site, then him, and asked the same question.

“I had recently split with my first wife, and the song is a nostalgic look back at my life with a woman I met in high school and loved for 17 years. I guess that’s why the opening melody sounds so mournful,” he said in our initial conversation.

Sad story, I thought to myself, but it must have been somewhat therapeutic to put those words and chords down on tape to memorialize the relationship. I’m still struck by how sweet the song is considering how sad the sentiment.

Lachot sings lead and backing vocals and plays acoustic guitar and Rickenbacker electric guitar on the track. He is joined by Stamey on the same instruments and vocals, as well as John Howie on drums, Mitch Easter on bass and Brent Lambert on nylon string guitar. An accomplished group although they aren’t a “group,” Easter has a host of credits in addition to producing R.E.M.’s Murmur, Howie sings lead for alt-country band ‘Two Dollar Pistols’ and Lambert is a mastering engineer.

“Chris Stamey produced the song and I give a lot of credit to him,” Lachot said of Stamey, his friend of many years. “I originally had the second bridge, where it slows down, as the end of the song. He made the change[to put it earlier] though, and that’s how it ended up. Some times, when you hear criticism like that you say Hmm, but it worked, and that’s what makes him such a great producer.”

Stamey was the founder and lead singer of The dB’s, sometimes referred to in regards to a ”jangle pop” sound they are known for from the Southeast college-radio music scene, likely because of the ringing electric guitars and slight country sensibility to their sound. I’m not sure if he cares for the “jangle pop” moniker, but I wonder.

The dB’s ‘Christmas Time’ is the staple song of the Christmas Time Again album. The song gained some fame after its initial release in 1986 and has gained a growing popularity ever since. This past Christmas it was a fixture on the Holiday mix in stores of clothing retailer The Gap. With just a few dozen songs on the Gap mix it gained even more exposure and is likely to be heard by more and more listeners in years to come. High energy, innocent lyrics, clever and classic melody, jangling guitars and Beatles-like harmonies, the song is a winner at first listen. It’s not a Christmas classic only because of its lack of air play and availability.

Hopefully in years to come, radio consultants, execs, programmers and the other influential beings who have never taken a call from a listener will put aside a Kenny G or Maria Carey Christmas song for just one rotation and play one of these two songs. The listeners will be rewarded.

Christmas Time Again is available on Amazon.com, other major online retailers, and on download at select sites. Lachot has never released a song or an album as a solo artist but this Christmas he experienced for the first time what it is like to have fans and admirers.

“From time to time, people find me on the phone or they email me telling me how much they like the song,” he said, adding that one of his musician friends has a special place in his heart for the song. “Peter Holsapple (who played with REM and Hootie and the Blowfish) told me it’s his favorite Christmas song.”

Lachot is extremely busy with the increasing demand for his studio design skills and is building a much bigger name for himself than he had as a studio musician, engineer and producer, which was considerable. It could be said, I suppose, that you can take the musician away from the studio but you can’t take the studio away from the musician.

He recently got back together with some of the aforementioned musicians for some live dates and greatly enjoys his re-emergence as a musician. He’s a graduate of the Berklee College of Music in Boston and is primarily a keyboardist and a sought-after player of the Hammond B-3 organ. He has also played countless sessions on guitar, bass, vocals and a whatever other instruments you can find in a recording studio.

“I haven’t let go of the music,” he said, despite of the demands for more than a handful of new studios each year from Wes Lachot Design. “I never seem to forget it and it’s a little more fun for me ever since I got back into it.”

As for Lachot’s “Christmas Is the Only Time,” I can only hope it gets more exposure on radio and beyond. Those who haven’t heard the song are missing something special. Many people like myself keep looking for new Christmas gems each year, and this year I found one. I hope you do too.

Copyright 2009