Christmas is everywhere by now. There’s no avoiding it. All the stores are bedecked and festooned, all the TV commercials have tinkly carols playing in the background, all the children are thinking greedy thoughts.

But it’s not even Thanksgiving yet!

For me, this is no problem. Christmas lights and music and decorations and dancing Santas can’t possibly come soon enough for me. But I understand there are some people out there who prefer to get into the holiday season slowly, not really acknowledging it much until after December’s halfway point.

But I’ll bet even people like that start to feel the yuletide pull when every storefront is red and green and every newspaper is filled with Christmas ads and every impulse-buy section at every checkout counter has those Reese’s peanut butter cups shaped like Christmas trees. They may even find the pull so strong that they feel a little bit like listening to some Christmas music, but they just can’t see themselves throwing on Bing Crosby or Brenda Lee in the third week of November.

Well, is there ever a solution for people in that situation, I tell you what. How about the 2006 Twisted Sister album A Twisted Christmas?

Holy eff is this album great! It’s Christmas, and it’s rockin’! Let’s take a look at the individual tracks, shall we?

1. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
I remember the first time I listened to this record, mere days after it came out. The first thing I heard were the opening strains of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” and I was in heaven. See, it starts out so lame, with a tootling trumpet and an acoustic guitar and crooned lyrics and I thought, “Well, I was hoping for an album in the Twisted Sister milieu, but the band trying to do these songs in a traditional style? That’s gonna be awesome, too.”

But it’s all juts a put-on. After asking “What is this crap?” The band tears into a full 80s-metal version of the song, and you know this CD is going to be the greatest thing you have ever heard in your life.

2. Oh Come All Ye Faithful
You know all those times that smart-ass music know-it-all kid (me) told you “Guys, ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ and ‘Oh Come All Ye Faithful’ are totally the same song” and you didn’t believe him (me)? Well, he was totally right.

I’ll allow the song’s music video to speak for itself, because it pretty much says it all. But be warned: Only push play if your face is ready to be rocked as hard as it possibly can.

3. White Christmas
You may remember that Irving Berlin was all pissed off in 1957 because he didn’t think Elvis’ version of “White Christmas” was duly respectful. Too much with the kids these days and their rocking roll and their hey hey and their pelves. Well, this recording of the song, with its jugg-jigga-jugg riff, probably has ol’ Irv spinning in his grave so fast that his bones are catching fire.

4. I’ll Be Home for Christmas
“I’ll Be Home for Christmas” is probably my favorite Christmas song in any of its versions, and this is easily my favorite of the favorites. It’s a duet with Lita Ford and it’s the most righteous power ballad ever. If the lyrics weren’t about Christmas and presents and trees, this song could be lighting up Bics in outdoor stadia all year long. It’s that friggin’ sweet.

And whatever happened to the power ballad? It’s almost a lost art these days, so let’s be forever grateful for this recording.

5. Silver Bells
The song first performed by Bob Hope (I love that guy!) and Marilyn Maxwell in the pretty great movie The Lemon Drop Kid here becomes something that totally rocks and, rather than encouraging you to donate money to the Nellie Thursday Home for Old Dolls, encourages your face to melt off.

Again, the music video can best explain. (WARNING: Video contains graphic depiction of a Dee Snider baby)

6. I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus
Oh sure, they say kissing, but in the Twisted Sister world of 80s metal concerts, you know mommy and Santa Claus were totally boinking like March hares.

7. Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow
Oh the weather outside is frightful? Maybe it would help if I kicked the weather’s ass with my electric guitar!!

8. Deck the Halls
Don we now our gay apparel, indeed.

Get it?
9. The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire)
More like your nuts exploding because of the flames shooting out of my guitar thanks to how bitchin’ Twisted Sister is! Very heavy.

10. Heavy Metal Christmas (The Twelve Days of Christmas)
Aah, the weak spot on this and every Christmas album. “The Twelve Days of Christmas is an odd thing: Nobody likes it, yet it shows up on Christmas records all the time. So people either show a total disregard for anything their audience wants by singing the proper lyrics and boring the tits off a she-bear, or they do what Twisted Sister does here, which is to sing new, “humorous” lyrics in place of the traditional gifts.

This time we get such Christmas presents as “three studded belts, two pairs of Spandex pants, and a tattoo of Ozzy.” Yeah, okay, it’s kinda funny, in a meager smile kind of way. But that’s the best these reworkings of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” can do. They’re always just kinda funny, in a meager smile kind of way. So why in the hell do people always record this song? Can’t we, as a people, unite behind the idea of expelling “The Twelve Days of Christmas” from the meme pool forever? Would anyone be poorer for it?

Despite closing with the weakest traditional Christmas carol there is, A Twisted Christmas will stick rock you up one side and down the other until you can’t stand it anymore. If all those Christmas Tree Brownies and Oreos with red filling you saw at the grocery store have put the yen for Christmas music in your heart but you think you’re still ready to punch anybody who plays Burl Ives at you, this album is just what you need.

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