Sleigh Bells Ring, Can You Hear Them?- Favourite Christmas Songs

[Darren]

Let's redress the balance a little with favourite tunes. Or your dream compilation, perhaps.

I love(!) these

I wish it could be Christmas everyday- Wizzard
Fairytale of New York- Pogues & Kirsty
All I want for Christmas- Mariah CArey
I believe in Father Christmas- Greg Lake
Wonderful Christmas time- Paul McC
Santa Claus is coming to town- Bruce Springsteen
Driving home for Christmas- Chris Rea
Merry Xmas Everybody- Slade
Step into Christmas- Elton John

[Lord President]

Santa Claus is on the Dole - Spitting Image!

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Stop the cavalry - Jona Lewie

Absolute classic. Although it's not necessarily a Christmas song except for the line "Wish I was at home for Christmas"

[Captain Tancredi]

It's probably have to be Nat King Cole singing Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire for me- I love all those "Christmas with the Stars"- type albums. Although having spent five years in my school chapel choir, you really can't beat proper carols arranged in four parts with descants- I can remember some of the bass parts so well that I can still harmonise to carols twenty years later.

[SiHart]

I think my favourite these days is December Will Be Magic Again by Kate Bush. There's just a magic about it that really appeals me.

I also really love Merry Xmas (war is over) by John and Yoko. It always makes me feel all Christmassy and warm.

And Step into Christmas by Elton John is wonderful in a cheesey kind of way.

Si xx

[Si Hunt]

I love "Merry Christmas Darling" by the Carpenters because it's gentle and peaceful and quite wistful. Also "Driving Home For Christmas" by Chris Rea because quite a few times in the past I've driven home for Christmas in the snow and this song always reminds me of that - making your way through the traffic thinking about the family and loved ones waiting for you. Also I love "When A Child Is Born" by Johnny Mathis because the spoken word bit always makes me smile! And I get a shiver up my spine when the multi-tracked bit immediately after kicks in.

Si.

[Simon R]

because quite a few times in the past I've driven home for Christmas in the snow

I didn't know you were driving in the 1950s.

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Also I love "When A Child Is Born" by Johnny Mathis because the spoken word bit always makes me smile!

Me too - it used to be used for a Christmas assembly by one of my favourite teachers "Taffy James" at Abbot Beyne. He was one of those teachers you just build up a great relationship with although ironically he never took me for a class, a true mentor. And even when I left school, as he tought the same subject I studied, we still chatted and talked regularly (he retired and did some extra study at a University I'd visit).

Was very sad this year to hear he'd died.

[Lord President]

Art Garfunkel singing "O Come All Ye Faithful" and "Fairytale of New York" by The Pogues and the late great Kirsty MacColl!

[Alex]

Let It Snow by Dean Martin, partially as it reminds me of Christmas, but also of Bruce Willis shooting lots of people to death in the first two Die Hard movies.

And every song from The Muppet's Christmas Carol - truly the best ever take on A Christmas Carol ever made. No, I'm not being sarcastic, it's a classic, and Michael Caine singing in it is the cherry on the icing.

I'd also second Ian's suggestion of Chestnut's Roasting On An Open Fire (but only when it's sung by Nat King Cole).

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without Slade

[Stephen Morgan]

Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without Slade

It certainly wouldn't. It always reminds me of my eighteenth birthday though. I haven't dug it out yet, but I will do, next week.
Since I was a kid I've always loved Harry Belafonte's version of Silent Night, can't bear another's version, it has to be that one.
As for Fairytale of New York, yes, the original is a classic, but you haven't lived unless you've heard my brother in law's karaoke version. It will probably be the highlight of our Christmas yet again this year.

[Rob McCow]

As you may not know, I am building up quite a collection of Christmas Tune Classics. It started with XFM's 'Cool Christmas' and now I have a considerable variety of classic covers, original tunes and amazing carols.

My favourites are probably 'In Dolce Jubilo' by Mike Oldfield and 'Alan Parsons In A Winter Wonderland' by Grandaddy, which features such lyrical classics as:

In the meadow we can build a snowman,
and pretend that he is Alan Parsons,
He'll say 'Have you listened to my new band?'
We'll say 'No but we really like that one song that goes "Time, keeps flowing like a river!"'

and:

Electronic Bands,
with frostbitten hands.

Aside from that, anything the Muppets do that is Christmas related is marvellous. Their version of The 12 Days of Christmas is paticularly amusing.

[Alex]

As you may not know, I am building up quite a collection of Christmas Tune Classics. It started with XFM's 'Cool Christmas' and now I have a considerable variety of classic covers, original tunes and amazing carols.

My favourites are probably 'In Dolce Jubilo' by Mike Oldfield and 'Alan Parsons In A Winter Wonderland' by Grandaddy, which features such lyrical classics as:

In the meadow we can build a snowman,
and pretend that he is Alan Parsons,
He'll say 'Have you listened to my new band?'
We'll say 'No but we really like that one song that goes "Time, keeps flowing like a river!"'

and:

Electronic Bands,
with frostbitten hands.

I've got that cd, and yeah, love the Grandaddy track, tis a classic. I'm very fond of the Drugstore song "Maybe At Christmas Time" too, as I love her voice on it.

[SiHart]

I like "Just Like Christmas" by Low and "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" by Belle and Sebastian best off that album.

Si xx

[Si Hunt]

Did we send you The Feelings Christmas song last year Si? That's a good one.

Si.

[SiHart]

You did! I'd forgotten about that... I must look it up again because it was fab!

Si xx

[cullsoft]

One that I don't think I've ever seen anyone else mention, but I've always enjoyed since I first heard it on TOTP2, is The Greedies's "A Merry Jingle"; I'll admit it's just the choruses from "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" and "Jingle Bells" repeated a couple of times to a Christmassy 70's rock backing tune, but it's a formula that works and it's got that upbeat and jolly sound that always makes me smile.

On a similar vein, I'm also very fond of Wizzard's "I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday".

[SiHart]

But have you hears the Wizzard/ Wombles Christmas extravanganza- I wish It Could Be A Womblin' Merry Christmas Everyday?

Si xx

[Matthew T]

Saint Etienne's "I Was Born On Christmas Day" is my favourite.

I also like Band Aid a lot too - especially the 1989 version.

And "I Believe In Father Christmas" by Greg Lake.

[Darren]

Saint Etienne's "I Was Born On Christmas Day" is my favourite.

I like that one aswell. The Band Aid 20 version of DTKIC is great.

[WhiteCrowNZ]

Bony M - Mary's Child

Is it me, or have Bony M kind of become a "forgotten band"? In the 70s they were huge, but you never seem to hear them talked about much today.

[Alex]

Not round Kathy's house...I've been subjected to them to an almost criminal amount!

[cullsoft]

But have you hears the Wizzard/ Wombles Christmas extravanganza- I wish It Could Be A Womblin' Merry Christmas Everyday?

Si xx

No, I don't think I have - I feel cautiously intrigued.