Christmas season brings out the worst in musicians. Perry Como, Barry Manilow, Josh Groban...what did we do to deserve this? We're good people. For the most part. We give to Unicef. We sometimes let people cut us off in traffic without giving them the finger. We hit our children less. We pray for more money. We buy bigger Christmas trees than our neighbors. And we put up more lights to show how festive we are.

And then the choices for Christmas albums just never match up to the dream. But here are five that should help you survive the season.

Phil Spector - A Christmas Gift For You From Phil Spector

We've written about Phil in this space before and if you didn't pick up this collection of his greatest Xmas productions then, well, you'd better do so now. Before he gets angry and allegedly does something violent. Proceeds go to buying Phil new wigs.

Jethro Tull - The Jethro Tull Christmas Album

I haven't heard this one. But I like the idea of it. Jethro Tull always used the flute

Writing books is hard work. I should know. I've never written one. Because it's hard work. Why would I? Besides, music books don't make money. Unless they're about the Beatles. Then I think they make money. But who wants to write another book about those guys?

But just because I don't write books doesn't mean that I can't admire other people who do write them. I've even been asked from time to time to review books. But that would require reading them. Reading them is hard work. You see where this is going.

Anyhow, I guess the beginning of "Reading Season" is upon us because all kinds of shiny new books have hit the shelves and everyone probably has a special someone they're going to have to buy a gift for come holiday season, so why not list the ones with the best titles and consider ourselves done?

Eye Mind: The Saga Of Roky Erickson And The 13th Floor Elevators, The Pioneers Of Psychedelic Sound by Paul Drummond: With a title that long it has to be good. And it's a "Saga," which

There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of books written about rock music. Most of them are horrible. Some are not about the Beatles, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. I went through my closet and found some music books I still keep and then I ordered some new ones so it would look like I haven't completely given up on life.

Here are five books about the rock 'n' roll that will not waste your time. Well, it'll waste it, but it will waste it better than if you spent that time surfing the internet looking for friends.

Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung by Lester Bangs: Lester Bangs is considered the greatest rock critic who ever lived, which is a bit like being in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the guy who's eaten the most pickles or ridden on a see-saw the longest. It's not much, but he'll take it. Aside from inspiring others to complain about all his imitators, which considering the bland useless capsule reviews that actually appear in magazines these days would be an

It's hard to come up with truly rotten John Lennon songs. The man did a lot of questionable things in his life, but when it came to songwriting he didn't let many lemons make it to the store. He edited himself pretty good. Now, sure at the sad hour of the anniversary of his death we remember the good songs he wrote. But Lennon was a pretty cheeky guy, who liked to keep an irreverent sense about himself. Or was he just insane to pal around with David Peel? So why not conjure up his worst moments? If he were alive today, he'd probably perform each of these songs just to annoy me. To which I would respond, Good show, my boy. And then his handlers would kick me to the curb.

We've done his five best songs. Now it is time to do his five worst ones.

"Revolution #9": Arguably not even a song, but a random noise collage that takes up half of side four of The White Album. Sure, it's good for a laugh once in awhile or if you've got guests over that you wish would go home. But once that's