Christmas in California does not look like the cover of this album for about 99.9% of its lackadaisical residents, I can assure you. With seductive lies aside, what this album does appropriately present is plenty of sunshine fa-la-las and hometown holiday melodies because, let’s face it… only Peter Nero can wistfully combine Jingle Bells with Winter Wonderland in that seamless Peter Nero kind of way.

This 12 track compilation is more your parents’ speed, provided your parents are that pipe smoking, holiday cookie-baking, smoking jacket-wearing, red cabbage-prepping dynamic duo of yesteryear… and, let’s face it… don’t all of our parents secretly wish to engulf that 1968 middle aged persona? I know mine do, although they’re reluctant to admit it.

Released in 1968 by RCA Records, although not necessarily my immediate go-to, classics by the classics (Arthur Fiedler, Al Hirt, Henry Mancini, Robert Shaw, Harry Belafonte, The Norman Luboff Choir, etc.) do deserve at least one spin a year, and today, apparently, is that day.