Music & Inspiration
1. “DUCK THE HALLS” blends Frank Zappa’s chaos, Weird Al’s parody, and South Park’s humor. How did you balance these influences while keeping it family-friendly?
Well, first of all, thank you for allowing me to be here, and Happy New Year’s, everybody. It’s always an honor to be part of KJAG Radio. Well, that’s a pretty easy question to answer. Bottom line, I respect tradition, and well, yeah, it’s a fine line, a balancing act, kind of walking a tightrope between having some fun and upsetting people, especially during the holiday time. That was definitely not my goal, to shoot flaming arrows, so I just wanted to do something a little bit funny and a little bit left field, per se’.
2. What sparked the idea to subvert a classic carol into a satirical rock track? Was there a specific moment that inspired “DUCK THE HALLS”?
What’s funny is, when I was talking to one of my friends who has a radio program (back in November of 2025) about one of my songs, I was thanking him for playing my music, and he asked me if I had any Christmas music, as he was preparing for the holiday season. I replied back to him that I didn’t, but the next day I started laughing, like, “Hey, wait a minute, I think I actually do have some Christmas music.” I clearly forgot about it, because I would say maybe about 14-15 years ago, I was asked to submit a few holiday tracks to the TV show Duck Dynasty. And if anybody remembers that show, it was about some people that ran a business that sold duck calls and things like that.
So I don’t know, it just kind of made sense at the time to take Deck the Halls, put some duck-quacking sounds in there and some duck calls, and turn it into Duck the Halls. Kind of a no-brainer, no big deal. But I wanted to keep the song itself as close as possible to the actual, real, traditional song as I could.
You know, just trying to make it a little fun without adding extra stupid lyrics to be clever, but just keeping it the same and putting a little bit of sense of humor and some yeehaws and yippee-ki-yay’s in there just to spice it up a little bit. Whatever, it’s about the stupidest thing I’ve ever done as a musician. It was definitely not intended to be anything serious.
3. As an independent artist, what unique freedoms or challenges did you face creating a holiday novelty song?
As an independent artist, you have all the freedom in the world to really do whatever you want, that’s for sure. You don’t have any corporate sponsors or record labels telling you what to do (in most cases). But truth be told, there is some inherent backlash that is intrinsic to the lack of holiday imagery, if you will. I am a cartoonist and an animator (just one of my hobbies), besides playing music, which I love. And I create a whole world of crazy monsters and characters; this is something I do for fun.
But as the years go by, the over-commercialization of the holiday season, to me, is just flat-out sickening. The real reason for the holidays is buried beneath an avalanche of TV and radio ads, and that just has nothing to do with anything except keeping the wheels of commerce turning. So with my animated video, I just made it a point not to have anything to do with traditional imagery. Not that it is bitterness toward the holidays, not at all. I just wanted to do something different. Just have some fun, that’s all. No harm, no foul.
Creative Process
4. Walk us through the production: How did you craft the “bold, unpredictable sonic punch” while maintaining the song’s goofy energy?
As I was saying earlier, this song was recorded almost 15 years ago. I had to track it down on an old hard drive, and thankfully my newest, updated version of Pro Tools software did recognize the work done so long ago, and I was able to revisit it and look at all of the different parts. One thing I had to do was re-record the guitars. I wanted it to be fresh and more modern, so I did that. Then I went out and hired a really fantastic mix engineer (Joe Ayoub) to make it as great as possible. Once Joe and I worked on the mix, it was then professionally mastered. And there you have it! Of course, I added a couple more yeehaws and yippee-ki-yay’s to spice it up a little bit here. But once again, it was just for fun.
5. The vocals feature Terin. What made her the perfect collaborator for this track?
What made Terin the perfect collaborator? Well, I guess she was the only one available that day to come over and do this lol. In all seriousness, Terin’s a dear old friend of mine, and I was telling her on the phone a long time ago that I was doing some holiday songs. One thing led to another, and it just sounded like fun to have her come over and sing on some of the songs. She really did a good job, definitely has great musical ability and a nice voice, and did not need to be auto tuned at all. I was very impressed.
6. You describe it as “G-Rated chaos” – how did you navigate satire without crossing into edgier territory?
To keep it family friendly, I didn’t change the lyrics whatsoever, as I was saying earlier. The song is very much in its traditional form. The arrangement just has a little bit of a country rock vibe to it. But as far as the anime cartoon goes, no one gets hurt. There’s no blood. No one gets stabbed. No gunshots. Santa doesn’t get stuck in the chimney, you know, whatever. Lol.
Visuals & Release
7. The animated video has a distinct South Park vibe. What was the creative vision behind the visuals, and how involved were you in the animation process?
I did all of the animation myself. I have a whole library of little sketches and drawings, and I pulled a few character sheets out of my archive and just thought it was funny to use some of the more silly and goofy cartoon people that I drew a long time ago, clean them up a little bit, and put them in the animation software. I mostly use Adobe Photoshop and After Effects for the visuals. The section with the evil tree with the evil eye and the laser beams that change the unsuspecting, bumbling characters into the little pink pig? That’s just something that was developed a long time ago.
Here is the link to DUCK THE HALLS on YT:
8. Why choose December 12th for the release? Does the timing tie into a strategic rollout for holiday playlists?
There really wasn’t much strategy as far as any type of release date, to be honest. I just wanted to make sure I got the ball rolling and got it out as early as possible before Christmas Eve. From what I understand, many artists record their Christmas holiday music somewhere in July or August, they take care of that months in advance due to the business cycle. And since I got such a late start on this, well, I just had to do it as fast as I could.
9. With platforms like Dr. Demento in mind, how do you plan to promote this to comedy/alternative audiences?
As of this writing, it’s already the New Year; it’s January 4th, 2026. The holiday season is over. So as far as marketing or doing anything with this, I don’t know. I guess I have to sort of wait till mid next year and plan early. What is encouraging, though, is I did put it up on YouTube with only a few weeks before Christmas, and it got about 21,000 views. That’s pretty good, considering, I can’t complain. It got played on a fair amount of radio stations, thanks to Curtain Call Records and the Rock Rage Radio Network. They help me get my music out to a wider audience.
Legacy & Future
10. If “DUCK THE HALLS” becomes a cult holiday hit like “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” what would that mean for you as an independent artist?
I don’t really expect that to happen, but who knows? Seriously, anything can happen out there. That’s why you just gotta keep putting your stuff out and hope for the best. I think it would be incredibly awesome If this dorky holiday song or literally any of my music became incredibly popular. I mean, who wouldn’t want that?
11. Any plans to expand this into a full album of twisted carols? Or is this a standalone grenade tossed into the holiday music scene?
No, there are no plans to continue with the holiday gag. I’m not interested in making this any type of trend. I still have four or five songs that I created while doing the thing for Duck Dynasty a long time ago, but I don’t really see myself putting too much energy into it. This was just for kicks.
So, to humbly regurgitate your words, yes, I believe this is a “stand-alone grenade.” But you better “DUCK.” You don’t want to catch any shrapnel. LOL
12. What’s next after the holidays? Can fans expect more genre-bending satire in 2026?
I am releasing BURNING BRIDGES on January 12th which is the 5th single from my EP, THEY ONLY LOVE YOU WHEN YOU’RE WINNING”. I’m working on the animated video as we speak. And as always, I’m excited to put out new music, and I really do hope that many people do enjoy what I do. I’m rehearsing a few musicians and I’m putting together a power trio. I’m scheduled to perform at the NAMM show In Anaheim on January 22nd which is very exciting for me. And I should be playing as much as I can this year and look forward to bringing my music to live concert settings.
*BTW, a Shameless plug if I may:
“THEY ONLY LOVE YOU WHEN YOU’RE WINNING” (my current 6 song EP) is Now Available for purchase exclusively on BANDCAMP. https://dansindel.bandcamp.com/
And of course, come say hi to me on:
FB: https://www.facebook.com/DanSindelMusic/
IG: https://www.instagram.com/dansindelmusic/
YT: https://www.youtube.com/@dansindelmusic
Bonus Fun Question:
13. If you could gift “DUCK THE HALLS” to one iconic musician (living or dead), who would get the most chaotic Christmas present?
Perhaps Weird Al Yankovic would appreciate it? I don’t think I would foist this song on anybody, to be honest with you. It’s completely stupid hahaha. Yeah, what do I know? Hey, but thank you for letting me be part of your KJAG questionnaire, I’m grateful and once again, “Happy New Year” to you and everybody out there.