This Year...
In the dim and distant past, well OK about six or seven years ago, the denizens of many of the chart- and pop-focused music forums (they know who they are) would spend every December focused on one particular topic. Would this finally be the year that <Notorious Christmas Song> finally overcame ACR hurdles and made it to No.1? Because, believe it or not, there was a time when that wasn't automatically a given.
The track in question was in fact All I Want For Christmas Is You, forever the top-streamed song of the time and somehow the subject of a long-running injustice that it had forever fallen short. Your esteemed host was actually once sympathetic to this, and indeed backed it for an unexpected rise to the top in 2007, the first year of full digital download eligibility.
However, by the end of the last decade I was a portent of doom, noting that once the door was open for Mariah Carey to reach No.1 in December, there was very little to stop herfrom doing so over and over again. Which meant it would go from an entertaining novelty to very boring indeed.
As we all know, that moment did finally come to pass. First in December 2020 and then in December 2022. But notably never again since. This is largely because the crown of "the nation's favourite Christmas song that they insist on streaming until we've memorised every last note of the bassline" has been passed to Last Christmas by Wham! Also, you will note, a song that used to be famous for never making No.1, but which now is up there every bloody year.
You guessed it. On the final chart before the official Christmas chart, a song that is now 41 years old, written and sung by a man who passed away 9 years ago, Last Christmas is once more top of the Official UK Singles chart. Because it is a Christmas record and a beloved one to boot, and the sheer volume of their streams means it, and others like it, drown out almost any trace of contemporary hits.
This is now the fifth time in six years that the celebrated track has enjoyed at least one week at the summit at the climax of the year. It crept in on the final chart of 2020, skipped 2021, had a further week this week in December 2022 and most memorably has been the Christmas No.1 in each of the last two years. Something it is now in prime position to do again this year - but more on that anon.
It barely requires me to state it, but this site is the journal of some kind of record after all. No recording in chart history has ever climbed to No.1 five times. But then again normal rules of engagement don't apply to Christmas songs.
The one rule that does apply of course is the permanent stranding of holiday songs over three years old on ACR status, where their streams count for half of those of contemporary hits. So the official chart sale of 42,470 for Last Christmas this week is actually over 84,000 in real money - both totals against which nothing can compete right now. It is a point I may make several times over the next couple of weeks, it is not that consumption of "regular" chart hits dies off in this period, nor is there these days a marked increase in the streaming universe. Just that catalogue plays suddenly start to focus on a particular narrow set of favourites, drowning out the competition.
So welcome back George, welcome back Andrew. This is the track's eleventh week at No.1 in total, and it stands a very good chance of extending that to 13 by the time the tinsel comes down. In search of something truly different to say about the song, here's a fact you may not know. The version everyone knows, and indeed streams, is not actually the original 1984 hit version. These days it has been usurped by the "Pudding Mix", first heard on the 1985 reissue of the single. It is billed as a remix but many parts - including George's own vocals - were re-recorded for the occasion. Despite selling close to a million copies first time around, copies of that original 1984 double a-side are now rather valuable for precisely that reason, the original issue having never emerged on CD either. Enjoy a take on Last Christmas I can more or less guarantee you haven't heard in 40 years. If ever.
Fated
Last week's No.1 single The Fate Of Ophelia is barely anywhere to be seen, the Festive Fog not only blowing it out of the water but ensuring that Taylor Swift endures a larger than usual ACR-induced dive down the charts. She falls 1-17 this week, oddly enough despite prevailing circumstances not the biggest ever such drop. That record remains in the hands of Olivia Rodrigo who tumbled 1-18 with Drivers License in 2021. It is still the biggest drop from No.1 since er, Last Christmas by Wham fell 1-83 in the wake of the new year clearout some 11 months ago. You may remember it.
Christmas songs this week account for 6 of the Top 10 singles, and indeed the Yule Log as a whole has now reached a grand total of 53 festive songs in the Top 100 as a whole - an all time record for this week (Week 50). The biggest three are from the usual suspects (Wham, Mariah, Brenda Lee) but fascinatingly the fourth is the slightly more contemporary Underneath The Tree as performed by Kelly Clarkson. For years notably the song that was locked out of the Top 10 time and time again it accelerates to a brand new peak of No.5, handing the OG American Idol winner turned TV host her first Top 5 single since Mr Know It All peaked at No.4 way back in 2011 - two years before Underneath The Tree was first released.
Nothing Festive About It
The biggest non-seasonal hit is Raye's Where Is My Husband which clings doggedly on at No.2 in the teeth of some quite stern opposition - and denied by just being around at the wrong bloody time for managing a single week at No.1. You may see some writeups suggesting that it can be considered a contender for next week's Christmas No.1, but alas they are wrong. It too will slump to ACR next week.
Meanwhile it remains Olivia Dean's world. So Easy (To Fall In Love) is No.6, Man I Need No.7 (and even if it were on SCR it would have surrendered No.1 to Wham this week), with Sam Fender's Rein Me In on which she features at No.9. Also holding its own amongst the onslaught, I Run by Haven and Kaitlin Aragon which lifts to No.14 and would be No.6 if you hold a no-Christmas filter up to the table.
Time To Be Lucky?
The No.1 album of the week is the new "Fully Wrapped" edition of Kylie Christmas by Kylie Minogue herself, an expanded version of the legendary Australian's 2015 album which had until now never advanced beyond the No.12 at which it charted in its first week on release. Her third No.1 album in as many years, it takes her all-time career tally to 11. The expanded album is home to XMAS, the biggest new festive-themed single on the chart. It accelerates to No.16 this week, still short of that further Top 10 single that die-hard fans appear to be dreaming of. But although it remains an Amazon exclusive for streaming, a raft of physical formats will give it a strong head start in the Xmas No.1 stakes. Whether that will translate into further sustained success during the week remains to be seen.
Meanwhile the other contemporary track noted last week, Gwen Stefani's Shake The Snow Globe edges its way to No.40 to hand the No Doubt singer her first Top 40 hit single since 2007.
Let Battle Be Joined
And so this is indeed Christmas - or at the very least the warm-up to the chart that will determine Christmas No.1. This is one of those points in the calendar where the dates fall unkindly, Christmas No.1 being announced next Friday (19th), the earliest it physically can be. Although in 1988, as I'm fond of recounting, it was decreed that the chart announced on Boxing Day and featuring sales right up to December 24th (for the shops were back then all closed on the 25th) would determine Xmas No.1. That experiment has never been repeated since, meaning that the "Christmas No.1" will simply be the song at the top of the charts on Christmas Day rather than reflective of sales and streams in the final gasps of the holiday build up.
It is the one week of the year when everyone pretends to care what is top of the charts, even if that bears no resemblance to anything at the top of the charts during the other 50-ish weeks of the year. I have no insider knowledge to impart other than to note that it will be one of three things. Last Christmas for the third year running has to be the nailed on favourite. Kylie will almost certainly top the "first look" chart on Sunday which will make people forget both their marbles and the fact that this early sales flash invariably bears no resemblance to what unfolds during the week. Or it could still be some kind of social-media inspired wild card. A random charity release with a momentum that we are all for now unaware of. But social media itself is fragmented and compartmentalised compared to years gone by. Anyone that does want to stage a coup will have to pull off a Christmas miracle of its own.
I speak as a man burned far too many times to predict anything with confidence. But if Christmas No.1 2025 tediously ends up as a four-decade-old song that we are over-familiar with, don't say I didn't warn you. Ho ho ho.
