Steelism Gets in the Spirit With 'Linus and Lucy' [Fresh Track]

With Thanksgiving in the rear-view, we've slipped past the event horizon of the holidays — note the Metro Christmas tree lighting tonight and the Nashville Christmas Parade tomorrow morning. No matter what holiday you and your loved ones celebrate at the end of the year (or don't, as the case may be), there's a good chance that your perception of this season has been shaped by the 1965 anti-commercialist animated classic A Charlie Brown Christmas. And that means you're almost sure to know the delightful and effortlessly cool jazz soundtrack by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, topped by the indelible "Linus and Lucy."

You can absolutely be forgiven for not knowing the title of the song. "The name isn’t as familiar as the sound," writes The New Yorker's Ethan Iverson in an appreciation of the soundtrack. "As any cocktail pianist can attest, drunken patrons fervently order 'Peanuts!' or 'Snoopy!' or 'Charlie Brown!' "

Music City's country-funk-experimental/mostly instrumental outfit Steelism has some holiday traditions of its own — see their supremely nutty 2015 single "Christmas Around the World." In the wake of their inventive sophomore LP ism, they've stepped into Jeremy Ferguson's Battle Tapes Recording and tracked their own version of "Linus and Lucy." It's been arranged for guitar, pedal steel, synth, bass and drums, borrowing from the Eno/Neu! school of kraut-y rock, and it's every bit as likely to get you dancing in awkward ways as the original. You can spin it via the YouTube embed below, and add it to your seasonal Spotify playlist right here.