Since releasing Despite Our Differences in 2006, the Indigo Girls have been broadening their songwriting and recording projects, trying out new recording techniques, experimenting with different side musicians, rocking up their sound more, and turning their trademark harmonies inside-out as they've continued to grow creatively as a duo. Holly Happy Days, their third outing for the IGR/Vanguard imprint and their first holiday-themed offering, is no exception to that rule. Containing nine standards and three originals, Amy Ray and Emily Saliers cut the set during two weeks in May. The tunes are a mix of sacred and secular numbers, from the traditional -- O Holy Night, In the Bleak Midwinter, and Angels We Have Heard on High (with Brandi Carlile on backing vocals), to less-often heard songs of the season such as Woody Guthrie's Happy Joyous Hanukkah, with backing vocals from Mary Gauthier and Janis Ian, and contemporary songs from Chely Wright (It Really Is (A Wonderful Life)) and Beth Nielsen Chapman (There's Still My Joy.) Generally, Saliers and Ray have rooted the album's sound in acoustic instrumentation with more than a little bluegrass flavor. Guest players include banjo ace Alison Brown, mandolin, fiddle, and guitar ace Luke Bulla, and bassist Viktor Krauss, to mention a few. Saliers' Your Holiday Song begins with Krauss' upright bass and Bulla's mandolin, and becomes a handclapping, anthemic, open ride. It strays from the bluegrass model, but even with its infectious folk-pop hooks, Brown's wood banjo and Lloyd Maines' pedal steel and dobro imbue it with a high lonesome color. Ray's The Wonder Song is straight-up, Bill Monroe-flavored bluegrass. Wright's tune, with a glockenspiel and Wurlitzer, walks on the swing jazz side of the aisle, and is one of the set's high points. The music to the Guthrie lyric was written by Lorin Sklamberg of the Klezmatics is another deviation, and one that touches on Yiddish traditional and klezmer music, but is rooted hard in the American folk of Guthrie. In sum, this is an enjoyable, somewhat offbeat, and fresh take on the holiday album, and another fresh chapter in the Indigo Girls catalog. ~ Thom Jurek, Rovi

1		I Feel the Christmas Spirit
2		It Really Is (A Wonderful Life)
3		O Holy Night
4		Your Holiday Song
5		I'll Be Home For Christmas
6		Mistletoe
7		Peace Child
8		The Wonder Song
9		In The Bleak Midwinter
10		Happy Joyous Hanukkah
11		Angles We Have Heard On High
12		There's Still My Joy