RADIO REVIEW : A Los Lobos Christmas on KCRW Today

This Christmas Eve Santa’s sleigh isn’t preceded by reindeer, but rather wolves--i.e., Los Lobos.

Baby boomers bemoaning the dearth of good, old-fashioned Christmas variety shows on TV these days can instead tune into National Public Radio for a nice fix in the semi-frolicky form of “Holiday House Party With Los Lobos,” a two-hour music special taped before a live L.A. audience and starring the band whose latest album, “Kiko,” just topped the annual Times critics’ poll. No cardigans required.

A definite home-taping prospect (and perhaps, as a freshly minted cassette, a last-second stocking stuffer for that hard-to-shop-for hepcat pal), this excellent special airs today at 12:30 p.m. on KCRW (89.9). Victims of Ebeneezer-ism who don’t have the afternoon off can catch a rebroadcast next Tuesday at 8 p.m. on KPCC (89.3).

Disappointingly, Los Lobos hasn’t worked up a single Christmas number as a band, not counting saxman Steve Berlin and guitarist Cesar Rosas’ instrumental duet of “The Christmas Song.” But what they have produced for their portion of the proceedings isn’t slack--not with a wealth of traditional Mexican music played to music-box perfection, or such unlikely but fitting holiday-time choices as Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Goin’ On” and their own depressively patriotic spiritual “One Time, One Night in America,” most everything leaning toward a delectably, collectibly acoustic vein.

Ironically, all the guest stars have managed to come up with some Christmas chestnuts to roast on an open FM frequency. She may not be Claudine Longet--quite--but Syd Straw probably comes off best of anyone here, beginning with an achingly lonely and gorgeous “In a Golden Dream,” being joined by Rickie Lee Jones for an a cappella “O Holy Night” and winding up with the host band on her good-rockin’ childhood composition “The Christmas Twist.”

John Hiatt isn’t in his best voice here, but his resuscitation of John Lennon’s “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)”--also with Lobos’ backing--is such an astonishingly appropriate idea that it overcomes the tentativeness of rehearsal and execution. Also on hand from the contemporary crowd are Dave Alvin, doing a rough but earnest “bar” version of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” and guitar maestro Leo Kottke, the lone holdover from last year’s similar T-Bone Burnett-hosted NPR Christmas special.

Befitting the heavily Latino vibe Los Lobos brings in throughout the show, East L.A. veteran balladeer Lalo Guerrero goes back to his seminal recording days of the late ‘30s for original barrio-themed Christmas material, and comic Paul Rodriguez recalls a sister in the early ‘60s baptizing Caucasian Barbies in chocolate in an early, homemade attempt at having “ethnically correct” playthings.

As hosts, the shy-ish Lobos are reticent at best, so a pair of wiseacre voiceover narrators, Comedy Central’s Nick Bakay and Steve Higgins, have been ubiquitously grafted on throughout the show.

The show isn’t half as holiday-homey--or as party-ish--as the title would suggest, but it’ll play fine long after the season is over.