Welcome to another installment of Reissue Theory, where we reflect on well-known albums of the past and the reissues they could someday see. Today's focus is the least-remembered Christmas album on Motown Records, from a lean but not unlistenable time in the label's long history.

One of the best things about the holiday season is the union of two of the greatest kinds of music: Christmas carols and Motown tunes. The definitive sound of the Detroit label, when paired with holiday standards, is blissful; when Motown did well enough to start adding their own entries into the Christmas canon, it was pure, unadulterated magic.

But today's post isn't about the Motown Christmas tunes we all know and love, by the likes of The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, The Miracles and The Jackson 5. It's a look at a much later, much different era in the label's five decade-plus history - one that's not heavily covered in terms of catalogue releases but one we turn our focus to today. Hit the jump for some Christmas cheers from Motown.

Motown's first Christmas song was buried deep on the second side of a novelty record called Twistin' the World Around by The Twistin' Kings (Motown MT-601, 1961). "XMas Twist" was one of nine instrumental twist tunes intended to ride the coattails of Chubby Checker's chart-topping hit, however possible. Like the best novelties, though, it has a bit of history to it: "The Twistin' Kings" were largely comprised of the band that Motown fans know as The Funk Brothers, that inimitable group of musicians who backed the first wave of Motown classics.

The first proper Christmas album in the label's history was Christmas with The Miracles (Tamla TM-236, 1963), followed by such chestnuts as Merry Christmas by The Supremes (Motown MS-638, 1965) (featuring mostly originals but also the splendid "My Christmas Tree," the first commercially recorded song written by TSD favorite Jimmy Webb); Stevie Wonder's Someday at Christmas (Tamla TS-281, 1967) (featuring definitive Motown holiday classics "What Christmas Means to Me" and the title track); The Temptations' Christmas Card (Gordy GS-951, 1970) and The Jackson 5 Christmas Album (Motown MS-713, 1970), which featured the debut of "Give Love on Christmas Day," penned by "The Corporation" (Motown head Berry Gordy, Freddie Perren, Deke Richards and Fonce Mizell). But once Motown had fully moved from its native Detroit to Los Angeles in 1972 (a move that will conclude the long-gestating final two volumes in the Motown: The Complete Singles box sets), it seemed the holiday spirit was left behind. The label's increasingly shrinking stable of stars in the 1980s (Smokey Robinson, Rick James, Lionel Richie) did not commit any Christmas songs to wax, and fans who wanted a Motown fix had to look backward to those great original holiday albums.

The late '80s were not an era one would have expected to see holiday cheer come from the label, either. Berry Gordy had sold his remaining ownership of the label group he created to MCA in 1988. The label's most commercially viable acts were either slowing down (Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie) or had left altogether (Diana Ross was recording for RCA, and Smokey Robinson was about to leave for SBK Records).

But at the very end of the decade, the label released Christmas Cheers from Motown, a nine-track grab bag from the remaining name acts in the Motown roster, including Smokey Robinson, The Boys (a low-rent Jackson 5-type band), Gerald Alston (lead singer of The Manhattans), Shanice (known for 1991's "I Love Your Smile"), Johnny Gill and The Temptations. The winning tracks are Robinson's "Everything for Christmas," an update of "Silent Night" by The Temptations (though the 1970 version from Christmas Card is superior, since it actually features some semblance of classic members of the group) and Johnny Gill's quiet-storm version of "Give Love on Christmas Day."

Motown would reach one last great plateau of success in the 1990s thanks largely to another male vocal group, Boyz II Men, who in fact recorded their own LP of Christmas originals (1993's Christmas Interpretations). That same year, Motown began combing their world-famous vaults and unearthing holiday tracks on CD from luminaries like Marvin Gaye ("Purple Snowflakes," "I Want to Come Home for Christmas"). Christmas Cheers from Motown remained largely forgotten until 2009, when UMe included "Christmas Cheer" and "Give Love on Christmas Day" on the double-disc Ultimate Motown Christmas Collection (Motown/UMe B0013383-02). Perhaps someday Hip-o Select might dust off the rest of the LP if they ever turn their focus to this leaner (but not entirely unlistenable) era of Motown Records' rich history.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJCkexYZUQw]

Various Artists, Christmas Cheers from Motown (Motown MOT-6292, 1989)

1. Christmas Cheer - The Boys
2. Remember Why It's Christmas - Janice Irby
3. Christmas Presence - Gerald Alston and Shanice
4. The Christmas Song - Desiree Coleman and Smokey Robinson
5. Give Love on Christmas Day - Johnny Gill
6. Silent Night - The Temptations
7. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - Desiree Coleman and Smokey Robinson
8. Everything for Christmas - Smokey Robinson
9. O Holy Night - Gerald Alston