August Burns Red Bring Holiday Riffage With ‘Last Christmas’ Cover
August Burns Red have become the patron saints of listenable Christmas song covers throughout their career. Pretty regularly, fans can look forward to the metalcore group taking on a popular Christmas tune and adapting it to their highly technical riffage. This year, they've turned their sights to the ever-classic "Last Christmas," originally written by George Michael in 1984 during his time with Wham!
Unlike covers of say, "Carol of the Bells," the biggest key to "Last Christmas" is how straight up exuberant the entire song remains. Bells jingle in the background as the group crushes their way through the song, letting each riff speak for itself. The song wishes all a farewell via a pretty reflective and peaceful sounding breakdown, a strange concept, but one they manage to pull off well.
"This year I sat down with the intention of writing something upbeat, melodic and shredtastic," says bassist Dustin Davidson. "When I decided to cover 'Last Christmas' I kept in mind that most people only know the chorus of the song. I didn't want to recreate something word for word, or note by note, so I took the main hook and built a bunch of original ideas around it. The lyrics to Wham!'s 'Last Christmas' are very sad, so if you're feeling lonely this holiday season, I hope this cover finds you well."
Back in 2012, they put together an entire album of holiday tunes with Sleddin Hill, A Holiday Album that features the hardest, most insane covers of "Jingle Bells" and "Frosty the Snowman" you will ever hear.
Hear "Last Christmas" above.
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