It was a hard time for The Kings at this point. After the success of The Kings Are Here, the bitter lesson and fallout from Amazon Beach left the band wondering what in hell they had done wrong. Bad advice from manager Randy Phillips (“Look, a lot of the people at Elektra that were on your side have left and so should we, don’t worry I can get you another record deal.”) had left the band without a deal and they went back to Toronto from L.A.
There was a lot of friction at the time and the future which had once seemed so bright was now in shadow.
The Canadian manager for The Kings, Gary Pring, had other ideas. If there was one person that never gave up hope for The Kings it was this man. He continued to get the band gigs and after he heard some of the new demos he took them to Capitol Records of Canada.
Diamond and Zero had a new song that they wanted to put out as a single for the holiday season called This Christmas. After meeting with Capitol A&R rep Deane Cameron it was decided that the song should be part of a four song EP. A budget was worked out and because The Kings were so afraid of having another producer change their songs for the worse they produced the sessions themselves.
The songs on this little record were recorded at Manta Sound in Toronto with old friend John Naslen doing the engineering. It was ready in time for Christmas and the single did well at radio. In fact, This Christmas is played every year across Canada and still sounds great.
The other songs have not stood up as well although As If I Cared was re-recorded for Unstoppable and still has a spot on The Kings set list. A Month of Sundays and The Chance have not been seen lately but may turn up on a part of The Anthology. RSVP is seen for sale on the net sometimes and is a must have for real collectors of Kings stuff.
