In November of 1984, Queen released the holiday single "Thank God It's Christmas". The song was released independent of any Queen album, with the B-side consisting of two songs from The Works, the band's album release from earlier that year. "Thank God It's Christmas" later appeared on the Queen album Greatest Hits III.

Wikipedia notes that the lack of a promotional video to accompany the song prevented it from getting much play on video stations in ensuing years, leading to it being one of the lesser known pop Christmas songs. That, however, wasn't the only disadvantage the single faced. A mere ten days after its release came the release of another Christmas song on the British pop music scene, Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas". Needless to say, that song garnered most of the media attention and generated the biggest buzz during that Christmas season. Still, "Thank God It's Christmas" climbed to #21 on the UK pop charts.

Soon after, Queen kicked off 1985 with a triumphant headlining spot at the Rock In Rio festival, then followed it up by turning in arguably the best performance of the day at the Live Aid concert in July. After a relative dry spell throughout the early 1980's, 1985 saw Queen's popularity on the rise once again.

The chord chart:
https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/crd/queen-thankgoditschristmas.txt

In the 1990s, Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart engaged in a musical side project, a band called The Lovemongers. Joining them in the venture was their long-time friend and songwriting partner Sue Ennis, as well as musicians Frank Cox and Ben Smith. The group released an EP and a full length CD, and in 1998 they released a Christmas CD entitled Here Is Christmas.

As I recall, that album was a bit hard to come by, but I remember buying a cassette tape single of the album's title song. The B-side of that single was a very nice acoustic guitar and flute instrumental rendition of the traditional Christmas carol "Bring A Torch, Jeanette Isabella".

In 2001, the Wilsons re-released this Christmas CD under the Heart name, titling it Heart Presents A Lovemongers' Christmas. It was issued once again in 2004 (with the cover shown at top right) with two new tracks added. A shortened one-verse version of "Bring A Torch" opens the album, seguing directly into "Here Is Christmas", while a full version of the song closes the album. The tab is of the full three verse version.

The tab:
https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/vartab/heart-bringatorch.txt

I'm hoping to have things up and running again within the next week or so. In the meantime... 

At 17 million plus hits on YouTube, there can't be many people who haven't seen this seasonal video yet, but it's always fun to watch again. I think it's pretty cool since it's almost local to me (relatively speaking), having taken place just over in Welland (Ontario) in the food court of the Seaway Mall. Chorus Niagara does a fantastic performance of the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's "Messiah", and it looks like it was a lot of fun for everybody.

Most-viewed tabs for the month of July 2010:

39 - Honeymoon Suite - Burning In Love
33 - Max Webster - A Million Vacations
27 - Doucette - Mama Let Him Play
27 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On
27 - The Poppy Family - Where Evil Grows
26 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
24 - Max Webster - Let Go the Line
23 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
20 - Honeymoon Suite - New Girl Now
19 - Girlschool - All Day All Night

Total Tab Views For July: 1,096
       
By section:  Canadian-691  Girlschool-194  Various-109  Chords-102

Most-viewed tabs for the month of June 2010:

36 - Doucette - Mama Let Him Play
27 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On
25 - Max Webster - Let Go the Line
22 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
22 - The Kings - Switchin' To Glide
21 - Harlequin - I Did It For Love
21 - Honeymoon Suite - New Girl Now
20 - Trooper - Boys In the Bright White Sports Car
19 - Harlequin - Innocence
18 - Toronto - Your Daddy Don't Know

Total Tab Views For June: 988

By section:  Canadian-712  Girlschool-164  Various-61  Chords-51

Sometimes you take a flyer on an album, even when you don't know too much about a band. You've heard a couple of songs and hope you like the rest. I did this back in the 70's with Jackson Hawke's debut album Forever (1976). And to this day it's one of my favourite Canadian "hidden gem" albums from the 70's.

Jackson Hawke, formed by Sault Ste. Marie natives Tim Ryan and Bob Yeomans, took its name from the surnames of the two main band members' maternal grandfathers. "You Can't Dance", the first single from Forever, enjoyed Top 40 success across Canada. The single had an added bonus in store for the band by essentially becoming a double A-side single. When DJs found the single's B-side was a cover of Van Morrison's "Into the Mystic", they gave that song airplay, as well. (The official second single was "She's the One".)

In 1978, American pop duo England Dan & John Ford Coley covered the song for their album Some Things Don't Come Easy, taking it to #49 in the US. They changed some of the lyrics along the way, as noted by the Sault Star:

Yeomans still gets a charge of the slight lyric shift England Dan and John Ford Coley applied to Jackson Hawke's signature song, omitting the line, "You can't dance, you're a three-legged cow," an effort, he contends, to cinnamon-coat what lyricist Ryan intended as a "totally angry thing." (http://www.saultstar.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?archive=true&e=799651)

The duo changed the line to "Find someone gonna show you how". Pop idol Rick Nelson also covered the song in 1977 on his album Intakes. He omitted the same line, by not including the second half of the Chorus at all. 

What Yeomans says is true. Both cover versions soften and sugarcoat the song, and as a consequence they lack the rollicking, edgier, bar-band tone of the Jackson Hawke original.

The chord chart:
https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/crd/jacksonhawke-youcantdance.txt
   

Most-viewed tabs for the month of May 2010:

27 - Harlequin - I Did It For Love
24 - Honeymoon Suite - New Girl Now
20 - Doucette - Mama Let Him Play
20 - Trooper - Boys In the Bright White Sports Car
17 - A Foot In Coldwater - (Make Me Do) Anything You Want
17 - Girlschool - Yeah Right (guitar)
17 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
17 - Honeymoon Suite - Burning In Love
17 - Max Webster - Blowing the Blues Away
16 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On

Total Tab Views For May: 938 
    
By section:  Canadian-612  Girlschool-169  Various-70   Chords-87