Graphic created by Lucas Seidel Design

The idea of doing a Christmas song had been kicking around for a while but this year we finally told ourselves it was time to make it happen. Initially it was an open call for whoever in the band could come up with a suitably festive song to record, and Joey Slater very quickly cranked out a demo of "You Made Me Believe In Christmas" that we all loved.

While we were doing a proper recording of that song, Gabrielle Sterbenz suggested "Feels Like Christmas", a song that she had written and mostly recorded a few years before but thought could feel at home as a Wheatus song - we totally agreed. And then Brendan cooked up "Mean Christmas" out of nowhere! Suddenly it seemed like we had an abundance of great options, and what started as an idea to release one song suddenly turned into an EP.Our friend Andrew Livingston had recently done a gorgeous string quartet arrangement of "Teenage Dirtbag" for us, which wasn't initially intended to be Christmassy but suddenly felt appropriate, so we tagged that on. And then of course it was "Christmas Dirtbag" - an idea originally pitched by a friend of the band that we weren't initially so sure about. But when Gabrielle cooked up the festive new lyrics, Brendan just adored them, and immediately envisioned a music video featuring our recently departed band dog Buddy. That was enough for us to give it a go. And just like that, the "Just A Dirtbag Christmas EP" was born!

@wheatusofficial And that’s how the christmas magic happened! #behindthesong #christmasdirtbag #wheatus #holidaymusic #festiveseason @Gabrielle Sterbenz ♬ Christmas Dirtbag - Wheatus

Learn more about Wheatus and listen to their song "Christmas Dirtbag" on our Chimneyside Chats playlist!