A Rock 'n Roll Christmas, various artists (Excelsior)

Excelsior is a low-priced line of CDs you often see bins of in stores at tempting prices, like between $5 and $8, and their secret is getting material licensed to them as cheaply as possible. Nevertheless, the approach works if they manage to dig up stuff somebody might want, and they did a pretty good job with this one from 1994. Although items like Elton John's "Step Into Christmas," George Thorogood's "Rock and Roll Christmas," the Waitresses' "Christmas Wrapping" and the Kinks' "Father Christmas" turn up on a lot of other compilations, they did manage to scare up Bob Seger's "Sock It To Me Santa" and another Jon Bon Jovi item not on the first two Special Olympics albums, "I Wish Every Day Could Be Like Christmas." Also here is the Emerson, Lake and Palmer version of "I Believe in Father Christmas," Billy Squier's "Christmas is the Time to Say I Love You," Elvin Bishop's gospel take of "Silent Night," the Moody Blues with a traditional reading of "What Child Is This," and Chuck Berry's "Merry Christmas Baby" -- the license holder probably wanted too much money for "Run Rudolph Run." Amazingly, this remains in print.