Black Label Society’s Zakk Wylde Talks Holiday EP and Digging Christmas

Zakk Wylde and his heavy metal band Black Label Society are turning things down a notch for the holidays and getting in the jolly spirit. Wylde recently released an album of acoustic, instrumental Christmas classics, ‘Glorious Christmas Songs That Will Make Your Black Label Heart Feel Good,’ which is now for sale on iTunes and eOne Music.

So, are these charming songs what you might expect to hear in Zakk Wylde’s home -- and famed “Vatican” studio -- around Christmas?

"Yeah, absolutely. My wife, Barbaranne, she's always buying Christmas records,” Wylde told Artist Direct. “In fact, that's how I first heard the Sarah McLachlan Christmas CD, 'cause she brought it home. That thing's … amazing, you know? Barb's always crankin' it in the house.”

Wylde, a professed Catholic, added that he “totally digs Christmas. When I was a kid, between my parents, my grandmother and my aunts, the whole thing was insane. So I try to make sure my kids have super-cool Christmases. Me and Barb do it up killer. When the kids wake up, they go crazy. That's what it's all about.”

While he joked that his favorite Christmas songs growing up included Motorhead’s ‘Killed by Death’ and Black Sabbath’s ‘Sabbath Bloody Sabbath’ (yeah, right!), Wylde finally admitted that he had a pretty traditional family upbringing. “… [We listened to] feel-good music for the whole family. No, you know, I heard all the same songs as everybody. ‘The Little Drummer Boy,’ ‘Rudolph’…all the warm, fuzzy things.”

Wylde and Black Label Society are currently on tour with Judas Priest and they join the Guns N’ Roses in December. Find a full list of tour dates, here.