Music
Forty years after it was held off the No 1 spot by Band Aid, Wham!’s Last Christmas is the UK Christmas No 1 for the second year running.
Andrew Ridgeley, who was one half of Wham! alongside the late George Michael, celebrated by saying: “Thirty seven years to get to No 1, 39 years to Christmas No 1, and then like London buses they all come along at once! I’m especially pleased for George, he would have been utterly delighted, his fabulous Christmas composition has become such a classic, almost as much a part of Christmas as mince pies, turkey and pigs in blankets.”
The quintessential song of yuletide heartache has become arguably the defining contemporary Christmas song: so ubiquitous that it has inspired the game Whamageddon, which involves people trying to avoid hearing it for as long as possible each year.
It remains massively popular not just in the UK but worldwide, currently getting 7.7m plays a day globally on Spotify, and it is at No 4 in this week’s US singles chart.
George Michael also appears at No 12 in the chart as part of the 40th anniversary version of Band Aid’s charity classic Do They Know It’s Christmas? The new version, spliced together from the three previous official versions, caused controversy, with Ed Sheeran and others condemning it for perpetuating stereotypes about the plight of Africans. But co-writer Bob Geldof defended it, saying “hundreds of thousands of people, probably millions, are alive because of a little pop song”.
Last Christmas’s nearest rival in the contemporary Christmas canon is Mariah Carey’s All I Want for Christmas Is You, which is at No 3 in this week’s chart – beaten to No 2 by the entirely unfestive That’s So True by pop singer Gracie Abrams, which spent four weeks at No 1 recently.
At No 4 is Tom Grennan with a new song, It Can’t Be Christmas, part of Amazon’s push to dominate the Christmas charts. In recent years the retailer has commissioned Christmas songs which it hosts exclusively on its Amazon Music service. With many listeners telling Alexa devices to “play Christmas songs”, Amazon’s own tracks are prioritised on its playlists, ensuring a rise up the charts. Smooth jazz singer Laufey is at No 19 with Christmas Magic, another Amazon-affiliated track.
Of the songs in this week’s Top 40, 29 are Christmas-themed, with Brenda Lee, Bobby Helms and the Pogues all reaching the Top 10 with their respective classics. One of the outliers is UK singer-songwriter Lola Young, who scores her first Top 10 hit with Messy reaching No 7, a slow burn success following its initial release in May.
It may not have been streamed in anything close to the numbers enjoyed by Christmas classics, but the week’s biggest-selling song is Freezing This Christmas by Sir Starmer and the Granny Harmers, which is at No 37. Created by freelance writer Chris Middleton and sung by Rat Pack covers artist Dean Ager, the song is a satirical cover version of Mud’s Lonely This Christmas which criticises Keir Starmer over Labour’s decision to end winter fuel payments for pensioners not on lower incomes. All proceeds from the song go to Age UK.
Capping a stunning year in which she racked up 21 weeks at No 1 with her hits Espresso, Please Please Please and Taste, Sabrina Carpenter continues to ride high, helped in part by Netflix show A Nonsense Christmas With Sabrina Carpenter, described in the Guardian as “a spirited attempt to drag the sometimes fusty Christmas special into the modern age”.
Her song A Nonsense Christmas is at No 16 while her album Short n’ Sweet returns to No 1 for the first time since its release in August – it hasn’t left the Top 3 since then. Michael Bublé’s evergreen festive collection Christmas is at No 2, while South Yorkshire rockers the Reytons have the highest new entry with their live album Clifton Park at No 5.