It is that time of year again. As we enter December and get into the Christmas spirit, the WorkPR team thought we would write a blog on our soundtrack to Christmas. In this blog, we share our favourite songs to listen to at Christmas.
Matt
Being asked to pick a favourite Christmas song is a lot like choosing your favourite film – a lot of the time it depends on your mood and how much you’ve heard/watched it recently. That being said, ‘Driving Home For Christmas’ by Chris Rea is certainly an all time classic and one that never gets skipped when it comes on the radio or Spotify playlist. I’ve also got a bit of a soft spot for East 17’s ‘Stay Another Day’ – an easy singalong song and one that caters to all ways of singing it, no matter how ‘under the influence’ you might be at the time!
Jamie
I do have a soft spot for Christmas music and regularly put on my Christmas playlist starting in November. My song for the Christmas period is Sia’s ‘Santa’s Coming For Us’. I heard it for the first-time last year and thought it was quite an unusual and modern Christmas song. It is now regularly on my playlist and gets me in the spirit of the season. The music video features well-known American celebrities such as Kristen Bell and will surely get anybody in the Christmas party spirit.
Eve
I adore Christmas. And I am exactly the type of person to switch the radio to one of the dedicated Christmas stations from November onwards. As such, asking me to choose a favourite Christmas song would be somewhat of an impossible task. It often changes. Certainly annually, and often even weekly on the run-up to the big day. Last year, for example, I started off with some classic Nat King Cole whilst putting up the tree and ended up wrapping presents on Christmas Eve with an open bottle of Port and Johnny Mathis on repeat. However, there is one album that has long served me as a warming soundtrack to my festive season, and it, strangely, is not even a Christmassy one.
Abbey Road by The Beatles, for me, always stirs up a warm, fuzzy, festive feeling from head to toe. This is possibly because back in 1995, when I was just 14 and most the WorkPR team weren’t even born yet, The Beatles Anthology began airing on ITV in the run-up to Christmas. The whole family would sit together in awe every Sunday evening, as we followed the story of the Fab Four on their road to superstardom. Then the week in between episodes would usually consist of me sitting next to the record player, listening to my parent’s beloved, scratched, and well-worn Beatles vinyl collection whilst doing my homework. And it was perfect. Joyous. Life-affirming, even. That year, The Beatles was the soundtrack to my gift wrapping. And in subsequent years, as I’ve grown, moved out, got married, had babies, the same has remained true. It’s still my festive favourite.
Why Abbey Road? I’m not entirely sure. But clearly, I’m not entirely alone in believing there is something Christmassy about it, as in 2017 John Lewis chose to use Elbow’s cover of Golden Slumbers in one of its seasonal ad campaigns. It was good. I liked it. But it was not a patch on the original. And it certainly lacked those glorious vinyl crackles that make a Christmas listen to Abbey Road so wonderfully atmospheric.
Fran
Nothing marks the official lead up to Christmas quite like a festive tune on the radio. Whether I’m jumping in the car to work or shopping for this year’s gift exchange, hearing a couple of Christmas classics always makes my mood a merry one. But which hit single is the best? Can there be just one?
For me, Paul McCartney’s ‘Wonderful Christmastime’ never fails to bring back the nostalgic feelings associated with this time of year. The opening two chords alone can be easily recognised by rooms full of people, and it’s definitely the first album track I play when December strikes!
Ben
As much as I enjoy a bit of Slade, Wizard and all the usual Christmas songs, it’s the more obscure Christmas songs that I really love. The less commercial songs that feel more like someone’s true personal experience and feelings around Christmas. The kind of songs you’d only hear in artisan coffee shops or in shops that can only afford royalty-free music.
December, by Guatemalan blues singer Gaby Moreno, is a perfect example of this. It sounds like a classic Christmas song from the early 20th century that you can imagine listening to on a gramophone whilst a warm fire flickers and snow falls outside. Her beautiful voice and the simple, innocent lyrics make for a really sweet Christmas song. So, while the radio is churning out the same old Christmas songs this year, why not find something different to listen to?
Laura
We have decided to write about our favourite Christmas song, I find it hard to pick just one when all of them bring happy memories and feelings of excitement. Come the 1st of December each year whilst putting up my Christmas tree it is time to whip out the Now That is What I Call Christmas Album with a glass of wine and hot chocolate for the kids. This year I needn’t pick a favourite as my 17 year old daughter already has Last Christmas by Wham on repeat, I can still hear it when I go to bed at night.
Jess
A Christmas classic and loved by just about everyone in the UK, Fairytale of New York is one of the only Festive/Christmas songs I still enjoy after spending 7 years of my teens and early 20’s in retail!
When you hear Christmas music on repeat from September to December for 7 years, it can easily destroy your ear drums and drain you of any Christmas spirit as soon as the twinkling of Maria Carey’s All I Want for Christmas is You begins for the 10th time that day. However, Fairytale of New York has never done that for me, no matter how many times I heard it.
Sometimes controversial because of its use of certain words, most people have a lovely memory around this song, including me. It was my late dads favourite as well as a firm family favourite too meaning it was always played around December in our house, with everyone singing along and smiling away.
Dave
So here it is….a merry Christmas song blog
For those of us of a certain age, there is only one definitive Christmas song; Merry Xmas Everybody by Wolverhampton rock band Slade. It was released as a non-album single in 1973 and became the band’s sixth and final number-one single in the UK.
I was too young to appreciate it at the time, but as my taste in music grew to embrace rock and heavy metal, Slade were a surprising inclusion. Personally, I feel the Christmas No. 1 the song became was actually the beginning of the end, not the springboard to better times for the band, with many writing them off as a novelty pop act.
They are a solid rock band, with a list of great songs including, Mama Weer All Crazee Now, Cum On Feel the Noize, Far Far Away and my personal favourite, My Oh My. If you’ve never heard Slade, I recommend you look beyond Merry Xmas Everybody, which will undoubtedly be played to distraction this Christmas and listen to their back catalogue, which I’m confident will impress.
