Christmas. What does it mean to you? Possibly no more than that your audiences, if you're a gigging concern, will be even more drunk than usual. And that the knackered Transit will be suffering even more than usual from non-starting and dodgy brakes.

If you're a recording type, you'll notice that Christmas is the time when your carefully soundproofed room will come in very handy indeed. Firstly, it'll be warmer than everywhere else in the building. Secondly, it'll be somewhere to sneak off when the spectacle of Great Aunt Victoria out of her mind on sherry becomes too much to bear.

However, the real benefit of Christmas, Comrades, is the decadent Western custom of giving each other presents. The chances of receiving hundreds of bottles of bath salts are, as ever, high, but in amongst the dross will hopefully arrive several more palatable parcels. Strings. Drum heads. Leads. Tapes. Maybe an effects unit or two, or even the instrument or gadget you've been hoping for since last August.

The best way to ensure this and to keep the ratio of gear to socks acceptably high is to leave a copy of this month's IM&RW lying around — the attached Christmas Gift Guide contains suggestions no parent/lover/spouse/relative should be allowed to ignore.

Better still, buy lots of copies and leave them all over the house; on the toilet seat, in the oven and fridge, pasted to the banisters, stapled to your Dad's forehead... you name it.

Just remember one thing: Christmas comes but once a year. Thank Christ.