Another Kind of Christmas, Ne-Yo (Motown)

The hip-hop performer brings his style of music to Christmas for 2019. It's a mix of originals and covers, starting with Donny Hathaway's "This Christmas," and you could imagine that a 2019 Donny Hathaway playing this song for the first time would sound exactly like this. He brings in guest singers Candice Boyd to take lead on "Carol of the Bells" and RaVaughn to sing Stevie Wonder's "Someday at Christmas," but takes back the mic on "The Christmas Song (Chestnuts)," "Merry Christmas Baby," and Marvin Gaye's "I Want to Come Home For Christmas." Originals include break-up song "Just Ain't Christmas," the explicit "Talk About It," "Open Mine Tonight," and the Caribbean-flavored "Christmas Vibez" with Satori & Dre Island. The tempos are mostly medium ballad to slow jam, with the outlier being "Merry Christmas Baby," which puts a modern spin on the original blues beat. I like this a lot, though I'd drop "Talk About It" from any office party playlists due to language, which includes use of the n-word.