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Until a few years ago, fans wondered if Steve Perry – the best known voice of blockbuster rock band Journey – would ever sing again after a lengthy absence from the public eye. After a celebrated comeback album in 2018, Perry ended his shortest gap between solo releases three years later, with the holiday album The Season; this Christmas, it’s being reissued a third time on a new label, with even more new material.

True to its name, The Season 3 is the third iteration of Perry’s holiday collection, which followed third album Traces, a stirring meditation on love and loss that proved his expressive voice had not degraded while out of the spotlight. The Season was a light affair, offering eight holiday standards including “The Christmas Song,” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” and “What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve.” A year later, a digital deluxe edition offered two extra tracks: a take on Donny Hathaway’s “This Christmas” and an original tune, “Maybe This Year.”

Now, as Perry switches from Fantasy Records to Dark Horse (the label founded by George Harrison, who entered a partnership with BMG Rights Management in 2020), The Season 3 adds another six cuts to the album, from the light holiday fare of “Jingle Bell Rock” and “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” to a recitation of “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas.” There’s even a pair of feel-good pop standards in the mix: “What a Wonderful World,” made famous by Louis Armstrong, and the Sammy Cahn-Jimmy Van Heusen classic “Call Me Irresponsible,” cast here as a moving, posthumous duet with Perry’s father Ray, who passed away in 1998. (The elder Perry was a singer and onetime co-owner of California radio station KNGS.) All the album’s sessions feature the musical talents of multi-instrumentalist Dallas Kruse (who collaborated with Perry on Traces) and celebrated drummer Vinnie Colaiuta, who’s toured with Frank Zappa, Sting and others.

In a statement, Perry suggests the partnership with Dark Horse may yet bear more fruit. “I’ve so much music in me that has yet to be heard,” he said. “To be able to work with a team of people who support and respect my creative expressions, is a dream come true.” In the meantime, The Season 3 will feature more of Perry’s immediately-recognizable vocals on even more feel-good songs for the Christmas season.

The new pressings are available on CD, vinyl and digitally on November 8 and can be pre-ordered below. As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases at the below links.

The Season 3 (Dark Horse, 2024)

CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

1. What a Wonderful World
2. The Christmas Song
3. Santa Claus is Coming to Town
4. This Christmas
5. Jingle Bell Rock
6. Call Me Irresponsible (feat. Ray Perry)
7. What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve
8. Auld Lang Syne
9. Silver Bells
10. I’ll Be Home for Christmas
11. Let It Snow
12. Maybe This Year
13. Winter Wonderland
14. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
15. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
16. ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas

Tracks 1, 5-6, 11, 14 and 16 are new recordings
Tracks 2-3, 7-10, 13 and 15 released as The Season – Fantasy FAN01461, 2021
Above tracks plus Tracks 4 and 12 released on The Season (Deluxe Edition) – Fantasy (no cat. #), 2022