The Sound of the Season

Local musician Nicholas Doyle loves Christmas music. And while the classics are great, Doyle and his band The Silver Bells create original tunes for the holidays. “I started recording semi-annual holiday songs in 2002,” says Doyle, who moved from Richmond, Vir. to Charleston in 2005 and performed his first Christmas show here in 2006.
“When I lived in Virginia, I had a friend, Lee Harris, who would have his friends record original holiday music in his home studio, and he’d give make compilation CDs and give them out and put them online,” says Doyle. I would take my songs and make handmade CDs and give them to friends and family.”
This year Doyle and The Silver Bells recorded an actual album of eight original holiday tunes. Entitled It’s Christmas, Everybody!, the album is available on vinyl at Monster Music in West Ashley. You can also download it digitally or order it on vinyl at thesilverbells.bandcamp.com. The album includes tracks such as “How Do You Forward Your Mail (From the North Pole?),” “Letter From Mrs. Claus,” and “Santa Doesn’t Care About You.”
This is the first time that The Silver Bells have recorded and produced an actual album. “I’ve given out homemade singles in the past — most of which we re-recorded for the record — but this is the first time they’ve been collected all in one place, with the same core group of musicians,” says Doyle. That core group of musicians playing on the album includes Jonathan Gray of Jump Little Children, Jack Burg of Punks & Snakes, Michael Flynn of Slow Runner, and the multi-talented Bill Carson of various musical projects around town.
Since 2007, The Silver Bells have consisted of Doyle and Douglas Thompson, along with a rotating cast of drummers/bass players/keyboardists, etc. In addition to Doyle and Thompson, this year, Ballard Lesemann and Danny Infinger played a show at Monster Music last week and will joint them for a show this Thursday, Dec. 10 at The Tin Roof in West Ashley. Jump Little Children’s Matt and Evan Bivins will sit in for the “Bah Humbug” Acoustic Holiday Spectacular at O’Hara and Flynn downtown on Saturday, Dec. 12.
After more than a decade of playing Christmas tunes, is Doyle tiring of Christmas music? No way! “Since we’ve done it for so many years now, I can’t really imagine the holidays without it,” he says.
Catch The Silver Bells in West Ashley Thursday, Dec. 10 at The Tin Roof, located at 1117 Magnolia Road. For more information, call 571-0775 or visit www.charlestontinroof.com