Christmas in Hollis

So, Christmas Underground posted a great, maybe even the best, cover version of RUN DMC's now 33 year old hiphop classic 'Christmas in Hollis.' Build on a sample from Clarence Carter's Backdoor Santa, RUN DMC's version is a Christmas party classic just like Slade's 'Merry Christmas Everybody'. It almost didn't got made, as this story would have it. But it did, it didn't float into obscurity, au contraire, it's been covered a lot. Why not look at a few reworks?

Let's start with that brilliant Porlolo cover. What's so good, is that Erin Roberts and her band made it their own, with the saxes, the different rhythm and the fact that Erin is singing the lyrics, not rapping:

I could give you many rap covers, sounding like the Beastie Boys having an off-day. That's not what makes an interesting version. I think the best versions are NOT rapped.

Or at least in a different manner. This one, it's very loungey, like slipping into something shiny and lacy:


Also from this year, like Porlolo's, is this version. There's rap, but the beat is home made. Literally.


Also very different is this version, now it's actually told like a Christmas story:

Gerald Dowd · Christmas in Hollis

This artist also tried to make the song their own, transforming it into 80s popfunk:

Ero Seagull · Christmas in Hollis

In that same vibe:
EDIT 2021:
Alas, this one by Karl Blau is not available to steam, you can buy it directly HERE.

Then this one, very lo-fi, banjo-lead folk-hop:

Just an acoustic guitar, at the speed of Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues:

And you can add a lot of guitars in the mix, of course


And, to close it off and to show the foreign appeal, here it is done with a thick accent, by a brass band:

Mr. Féonor · Christmas In Hollis

Want more? Download HERE a Primus-y, wonky jazzyrock version of Christmas in Hollis by Thunderbirds are Now.