Interview and video: Oklahoma rocker JD McPherson unrolling original Christmas album 'Socks' tonight at OKC concert

An abbreviated version of this story appears in Friday's Weekend Life section of The Oklahoman.

Rock 'n' roll Christmas: Oklahoma native JD McPherson brings new seasonal album 'Socks' home for the holidays

If someone had told JD McPherson five years ago that he would be coming back to Oklahoma from his home in Nashville, Tennessee, to play a show of his all-original Christmas songs, he probably wouldn’t have believed it.

“I would have said, ‘How dare you?!’” the Oklahoma native said with a chuckle. “I was definitely ‘no, I will never do a Christmas album.’ I have said that out loud a couple of times. It’s just, at the very beginning of my sort of I guess professional career – because I always had bands, but I was in my early to mid-30s when I started touring and doing this thing for a living – I was like, ‘Oh, God, please don’t take this away from me.’ So, anytime anybody asked me to do something, I did it. I said yes to so many things, and one of the things I said yes to was a Christmas song. And it turned out fine, and it did well for us and everything. And I said, ‘I will never do it again. I mean never.’ 

"And it just goes to show that the old saying ‘never say never’ actually holds water, because I ended up doing it. I just got an idea to do it … and it kind of all came together and it worked out all right.”

If he was going to make a Christmas record, the renowned singer-songwriter and guitarist, who hails from Broken Arrow, opted to make an unconventional one, right down to the name: “Socks.” The title track is a slinky blues ode from a child disappointed to find foot coverings in his stocking, while the rip-roaring rocker “Santa’s Got a Mean Machine” gallops through the tale of a hot-rodding St. Nick. His previous yuletide song, the swinging “Twinkle (Little Christmas Lights)” is featured on physical copies of “Socks.”

“It’s just a rock ‘n’ roll album. … No ‘Jingle Bells’ allowed,” McPherson said, adding that he and his band will play not only most of “Socks” but also some unusual covers and songs from their previous three albums in his Oklahoma City concert Friday night at the Tower Theatre.

Early inspiration

Raised in rural southeastern Oklahoma, near Talihina, McPherson said his shuffling acoustic number “Ugly Sweater Blues” is based on actual childhood events.

“I’ve got all these pictures. I was born 16 years after my older brother, so it was like I was the only kid even though I have three brothers and a sister. I was the only kid left at the house. Every picture seems like Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, they’ve got me in some ridiculous thing, some ridiculous tuxedo with the ruffled chest … and the velvet pantaloons,” he said in a recent phone interview.

Wearing the ugly sweaters and staying on the nice list paid off as his musical interests began to broaden.

“I was a really good kid. I was very obedient. I honored my father and mother like the Bible says. … I never really got into much trouble, and I think because of that, they sort of let me follow other things. They didn’t complain much when I started listening to Black Flag. They knew I wasn’t drinking underage; I didn’t drink a drop of alcohol ‘til I was 21 years old,” McPherson, 41, said. “I was more of a subversive with books and music; that was sort of my life. As long as they saw that I had my head on straight, they kind of let me get into some of the weird ideas that are out in the world.”

His love of 1950s rock ‘n’ roll inspired his debut album,” 2010's “Signs and Signifiers,” and most fans who love his breakthrough collection will happily slip right into “Socks,” which is woven from 10 original songs that all sound like classic Christmas music of the 1940s and ‘50s.

“For me, that’s the only way to go. I don’t really jive too much on Christmas music outside of that time. Mariah Carey gets a pass; I will listen to that song a few times during December. … I’m sure if Kraftwerk made a Christmas record, I’d probably listen to it. But the Bing Crosbys of the world and Darlene Love, I’m mostly interested in that,” McPherson said. “Whereas our other records kind of started getting weirder and weirder and louder and fuzzier, this record made sense to go back to kind of the early sounds of rock ‘n’ roll. I was more inspired that way, and it was fun to do it, too. … It was like maybe climbing into your dad’s car to ride around in again.”

Unusual combinations

Just as the holidays bring together unusual combinations like peppermint and sugarplums, McPherson said his new yuletide collection was inspired by the odd pairing of admiring Nick Lowe’s 2013 Christmas album “Quality Street” and rereading “Hound Dog,” the autobiography of iconic songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, who penned songs for the Drifters Coasters, Elvis Presley and the Coasters.

“The Coasters were sort of our muse … and I was like, ‘Wow, so if The Coasters had made a Christmas record with Leiber and Stoller, that is something that I would like to hear.’ So, that was kind of the starting point for some of the songs on the record,” McPherson said, adding that the effervescent ballad "Holly, Carol, Candy & Joy,” about an earnest ladies' man in love with four women who all just happen to have Christmassy names, pays homage to The Coasters’ doo-wop sound.

“Nick Lowe is an inspiration to me all the time, so if I see him do something, I want to do it, too. And he made an incredible Christmas record called ‘Quality Street,’ which is a great title ‘cause it makes absolutely no sense. But I found out that Quality Street is a brand of chocolate that people give each other in the U.K. every year, so it wouldn’t make sense to the U.S. … His record is a really smart, kind of snarky album that defies all clichés.”

The former schoolteacher’s Christmas collection doesn’t get too sticky with holiday sentimentality, but it isn’t a bah-humbug either.

“I kind of have both in me: I have the 5-year-old, enthusiastic, ‘I love everything about this’ kind of attitude towards Christmas, but I also kind of have a cynical veneer over a few things. So, I kind of tried to cover both bases, appeal to the Scrooges and the Tiny Tims alike,” he said. “You know, Scrooges need love, too.”

Home-state return

Although McPherson said he never plays Christmas music until after Thanksgiving, his holiday album was recorded during the warm spring at Alex The Great in his adopted hometown of Nashville, where he and his family moved about three and a half years ago.

“This city is built on songwriting, so songwriting is the reason why I moved here. But once I got here, you know, my label’s here, all the PR people, all the radio people I work with are here. You can get mandolin strings at 3 in the morning if you need to, there’s a ton of musicians, and a lot of my friends and every band I know comes through Nashville. So, there’s just a lot of work that you can get done here,” McPherson said. “It’s great, but I do miss Oklahoma a lot. But we go back a few times a year, and I actually work a lot with people from Oklahoma.”

McPherson said he is excited to make a holiday return to his home state not only to spend Christmas with his family but also to make his debut with his all-ages yuletide show at OKC’s recently restored Tower Theatre.

“We usually land in Tulsa, and we’ve played Oklahoma City a couple of times. It’s always kind of been a big, full Cain’s Ballroom show vs. a smaller OKC show. But now with the Tower, I think there’s kind of a growing the live music crowd for that venue, and I’m really excited to play it, because I’ve got so many friends and memories in the OKC metro area. So, I’m real excited to be there,” he said.

“Nashville works really good if you’re in the music business, but man, there is something special about Oklahoma. ‘Oklahoma is OK’ if you remember that license plate.”

IN CONCERT

JD McPherson

When: 8 p.m. Friday. Doors at 7 p.m.

Where: Tower Theatre, 425 NW 23.

Tickets and information: www.towertheatreokc.com.

-BAM