It's Christmas All Over | |
Type: | studio |
Artist: | Goo Goo Dolls |
Cover: | Goo Goo Dolls - It's Christmas All Over.jpg |
Alt: | A piano, guitar, and amp covered in colorful Christmas lights |
Recorded: | 2019–2020 |
Length: | 33:24 |
Label: | Warner |
Prev Title: | Miracle Pill |
Prev Year: | 2019 |
Next Title: | Rarities |
Next Year: | 2021 |
It's Christmas All Over is a 2020 Christmas album from American alternative rock band Goo Goo Dolls, released on October 30, via Warner Records. It has received mixed critical reception.
The band initially planned to tour in support of 2019's Miracle Pill through mid-2020 but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, those plans were scrapped and the band members wrote music in their homes and recorded them at a studio in Boyle Heights, finalizing the work in the band's studio GCR Audio in Buffalo, New York. They made a conscious attempt to not record harder rock versions of the standards, instead opting for traditional pop sounds. In lieu of touring, the band livestreamed virtual "augmented reality movie musicals" in October and December that would allow audience members to control the camera and watch them perform.
"Let It Snow" was released for streaming, followed by "This Is Christmas" in mid-October.
In 2021, the band released a "Deluxe Digital Edition" which included two bonus tracks: "I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm," first included as a bonus download with purchase of the CD or LP, and "One Last Song About Christmas," a new original song.
In 2023, the band released a re-edition called "It's Christmas All Over (Again) which contains one bonus track; the new original song "Who's Gonna Hear Their Wish?".
Hal Horowitz of American Songwriter gave this album 2.5 out of five stars, criticizing it for being bland, with some muted praise for varied musical genres and experimentation, he sums up, "the project could have been much more interesting if it rocked harder and the song choices didn't revert back to some obvious, and worn out standards that find the Goo Goo Dolls doing something they never would have considered in their earliest days; playing it safe". Andy Von Pip of Under the Radar gave this album a 5.5 out of 10, noting that "the two original self-penned songs that really do hit the mark and hint at what might have been" but the work is primarily padded with "pedestrian" covers and it is ultimately a "rushed tick box exercise trying to cover all festive bases but rarely hitting a home run".
Bonus digital download
2021 deluxe edition additional tracks
2023 deluxe edition bonus track
Goo Goo Dolls
Additional personnel