Tom Freund hangs his hopes for holidays on the mantle in his new single What’s Up Christmas Stocking — premiering exclusively on Tinnitist.
The veteran singer-songwriter’s new holiday release is a string-laden, piano-anchored love song that sweetly and sincerely captures the meaning of the holidays — how we somehow always find our way home, wherever we are, in time for Christmas:
“What’s up Christmas stocking
It’s you I miss the most
You came into my apartment
And you scared away the ghosts of Christmas past
Gone at last
Yeah we burned the midnight oil
Shadows dancing on the wall
And we played the grand piano
Til the snow began to fall
Ho ho ho ho.”
“Reflecting back, I’m pretty sure that I wrote this one to assure myself that I wasn’t alone,” he says. “A lot of my songs are notes to self. And it was also simultaneously a way for me to reach out to someone I care about and was missing.”
What’s Up Christmas Stocking has playful twists in it as well — some relationship-isms and some L.A.-isms, like when Freund sings about “the dirty boulevard of broken dreams.” “I think the overall message is that you’re never alone — even for those that might feel that way on the holidays,” he says. “You’ve gotta trust.”
The song was recorded by engineer Robi Banerji at Village Studios in L.A., and features former Jeff Buckley drummer Matt Johnson. Freund later added upright bass, as well as strings from Ollie Kraus at his home studio.
Over the course of his career, Freund has released more than a dozen records, recorded and performed with legends such as Elvis Costello, Jackson Browne and his long time collaborator Ben Harper, with whom he’s made numerous albums and toured the world. Freund has also toured with Graham Parker, and appeared with him in the Judd Apatow film This Is 40.
Freund has spent much of his career traversing genres, melding whatever sounds that happen to catch his whimsy. His songs have been featured on TV shows including Better Things, Parenthood and One Tree Hill. For his latest television project, the show Pete The Cat, Freund co-wrote, sang and played songs with KT Tunstall, Dave Matthews and Diana Krall. His most recent album, 2022’s pandemic-penned The Year I Spent In Space, features a guest spot from fellow singer-songwriter Brett Dennen. He is also well known as a multi-instrumentalist, performing on guitar, upright bass, mandolin, ukulele, piano or and just about anything else in the room.
Check out What’s Up Christmas Stocking above, hear more from Tom Freund below, and wish him the best on his website, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
