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Questlove Shares His Favorite Christmas Songs on NPR's 'Fresh Air'

Questlove Shares His Favorite Christmas Songs on NPR's 'Fresh Air'

Published Thu, December 22, 2022 at 2:27 PM EST

Questlove shared a Christmas mixtape with NPR's popular program Fresh Air hosted by Terry Gross. The Academy Award winner shared his holiday picks on Dec. 21 during a segment on the show, which included tracks from DRAM (featuring his mother BigBabyMom), James Brown, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder.

Quest called DRAM's version of "Silver Bells" unique. “It’s almost like him and his mom are allowing us to sort of eavesdrop at the family gathering where they’re just singing to each other,” he said. “And I really love the fact that they didn’t overproduce this. This is a really raw version of the song. So it kind of hits home to me.”

He then shared one of his favorite Christmas memories, which was at the Dupont Plaza in San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1982. His father, Lee Andrews had a residency, he'd often hear Michael Jackson's Thriller. James Brown’s “Santa Claus, Santa Claus,” Akim & Teddy Vann’s “Santa Claus Is A Black Man,” and Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye’s “Christmas in the City" were also among his picks.

“‘Christmas in the City’ is just one of the most depressing-sounding, sad, lonely [songs] — it’s almost the music I would expect [from] the Charlie Brown Christmas special,” Quest said. “[There’s] just something hilarious about hearing Marvin Gaye struggle with this monophonic synthesizer, turning it into the blues.”

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