The Pogues and Kristy MacColl’s “Fairy Tale of New York” is officially the most played Christmas song of the 21st century.
Music body PPL totals up every public airing of the song in Britain. Its calculations include plays on the radio, TV, and as background music in shops, bars, gyms, and restaurants. They began their calculations in 2000.
The song, released in 1987, never reached number one in the charts in Britain, but is played around the world every Christmas. It has also been featured in the UK’s top 20 chart on seven occasions.
Jonathan Morrish, spokesman with PPL, said “Fairytale of New York is a timeless classic which everyone knows and rightfully deserves its place at the top spot”.
Writing in the Irish Times, Joe Cleary, a lecturer in the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, said that the song told the story of the reality of Irish emigration and what lay behind the “American Dream”.
He wrote, “With the exception of Joyce's ‘The Dead’ or Patrick Kavanagh's ‘Advent’, no work of the 20th-century Irish imagination has managed to illuminate a particular sense of Christmas so well as that song has done…It is at once a twisted love song, an emigrant ballad, and an anthem to the capital city of the 20th century. And it is perhaps for that reason that it is the only "Christmas classic" that one can hear without wincing in July."
Here’s the list of “The most played Christmas songs”:
1. Fairytale of New York (1987), The Pogues
2. Last Christmas (1984), Wham
3. All I Want for Christmas is You (1994), Mariah Carey
4. I Wish it Could be Christmas Everyday (1973), Wizzard
5. Do They Know it's Christmas? (1984), Band Aid
6. Merry Xmas Everybody (1973), Slade
7. Driving Home for Christmas (1988), Chris Rea
8. Step into Christmas (1973), Elton John
9. The Power of Love (1984), Frankie Goes To Hollywood
10. Merry Christmas Everyone (1985), Shakin' Stevens
Here’s the video for “Fairytale of New York”:
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.thomasjhennigan | Dec 24, 2012, 07:55 PM EST
Greatest Christmas song of all time. Shane McGowan is a genius.
thomasjhennigan | Dec 24, 2012, 07:42 PM EST
IrelandNorth, Shane McGowan was born in County Tipperary and was taken to England as a child
IrelandNorth | Dec 19, 2011, 07:10 AM EST
Christy Moore once describe Shane McGowan's voice as the purest channel of Irishness he ever heard. And Christie's been around since the early 1960's. It's definately a classic. Makes me feel homesick even when I'm at home! I wish Shane well in his struggle with alcohol addiction. He once described himself depreciatingly as a "plastic Paddy" (i.e. and Irishman born in England). And Kirsty - RIP!
ciaradexy | Dec 18, 2011, 05:54 PM EST
Best christmas song ever written! love when this comes on the radio It gets me feeling all christmasy even though I hate christmas and all its hallmark card crap.
ellenfromcork | Dec 17, 2011, 05:14 PM EST
I raise my glass to Searlit and ballyhip and sirpeter and to all who posted here. What a dull old world it would be if we all agreed. There would be no craic at all.
Searlit | Dec 16, 2011, 11:27 PM EST
I think it's a great song.
ballyhip | Dec 16, 2011, 10:29 PM EST
Yes, ellenfromcork, I remember the St.Stephan's Day song from the album. Elvis Costelloe I believe. We appear to be in the minority on this forum but who cares. It is the essence of discourse and we see the person revealed by the rhetoric. To be fair, it is over time. I learn a lot from the responses and hope that everyone else does.
sirpeter | Dec 16, 2011, 09:21 PM EST
peterson.That's the whole point of the song.You can't turn on happiness in a person because society decides this is a time to be happy.That's the meaning.I'll put it another way.A good looking confident teenage girl enjoys the attention she gets from all the boys at a party.But a fat ugly under confident girl who is left alone in the corner at the same party is miserable but is still forced to be there.Some suffer Christmas.
ellenfromcork | Dec 16, 2011, 07:24 PM EST
ballyhip, I believe you have grasped the essence of this song.For many, Christmas is wrapped up in pain because the reality of some peoples lives does not match the presumed joy of the season. I love this song as an antidote to the syrupy sweetness of Christmastide. Another good one is The St Steven's Day Murders on The Bells of Dublin by The Chieftains.
Lauraine | Dec 16, 2011, 06:06 PM EST
If this trash is the most played Christmas song, I just want to cry. The line that stood out to me was her calling him a S__bag. This garbage has nothing to do with the sacred day of Christmas. This is a drunken pub song and even then, it's ugly and degrading. If Bing Crosby doesn't cut it, how about John Lennon's "So this is Christmas"? At least he was connected to humanity and had morals. God Bless Us All.
TessMarie | Dec 16, 2011, 05:41 PM EST
You have got to be kidding!!!!
peterson | Dec 16, 2011, 05:28 PM EST
Very poor taste !! Where is the real meaning of Christmas in this tale !!
RedBranch | Dec 16, 2011, 04:30 PM EST
'Fairytale' doesn't jump the pond too well. Associating Christmas with drunkeness and lover's tiffs doesn't gel with the Coke endorsed version so accecpted in the States.
ballyhip | Dec 16, 2011, 04:05 PM EST
I get a kick out of some of these comments. I'll be 71 in March and have been listening to F...of...NY for years. As a matter of fact, heard it yesterday on WMVY (Martha's Vineyard & Newport, RI) which is also available on the internet. Love to play it to shake up the toora loora IA's out there. You could not have not heard it before! Second best Xmas song is Tom Lehrer's Christmas Carol. Here are some of the lyrics: Hark the herald tribune sings, Advertising wondrous things. God rest ye merry, merchants, May you make the yuletide pay. Angels we have heard on high Tell us to go out and buy! Catch him on YouTube.
sharlot | Dec 16, 2011, 04:03 PM EST
HUH??
SeamusMartin | Dec 16, 2011, 12:13 PM EST
The song "Fairytale if NY" has a melancholy ring to it. Never heard it 'til now. This list could not be from Amerikay unless ones looking at an group of 20 year olds. I thought John Lennon's "So This Is Christmas" and Bing Crosby and David Bowie's take on "Little Drummer Boy" would be in the top ten. I'm about 60 and have been involved in music all my life and never, ever heard of any of that top ten... not on the radio, in church, at school or on TV. Why don't you list America's Top Ten.
EdMahoney1 | Dec 16, 2011, 12:07 PM EST
I've never heard this trash before & hopefully will never again.
pat52rk | Dec 16, 2011, 12:07 PM EST
is this a joke, White Christmas by Bing Crosby is the most played Christmas song of all time , fairytale of New York is only heard in Ireland and the UK ..
ceceann | Dec 16, 2011, 11:57 AM EST
You must be joking!
jackinny | Dec 16, 2011, 11:14 AM EST
@rineharts & @sirpeter How right you both are!!! All I had to do was read the rest of the list to see how meaningless this compilation is. With the exception of Band Aid- these are truly awful- only a low brow culture like the one in Britain would elevate them to this status. I have spent enough time from December til January in Ireland & the UK to know THE BRITS REALLY LOVE THIS DRECK
beachcomber | Dec 16, 2011, 10:30 AM EST
Agree with Rinehart...I was so excited to read the headline, thinking FINALLY this awesome song gets the props it deserves...then read that "in Britain" part and felt deflated. Thanks IrishCentral, for bursting a Christmas miracle for me. BAH HUMBUG!
RinehartS | Dec 16, 2011, 09:59 AM EST
'Tis a great song. Two things, might want to mention this is a UK chart (too many people in the US still don't know this song for it to be that big a hit here). And that's not Kirsty!
BiffSissy | Dec 16, 2011, 09:48 AM EST
Awful and certainly not reflective of Christmas. It is the only song that does make me cringe
sirpeter | Dec 16, 2011, 09:21 AM EST
Not sure what you mean by a twisted love song.It's about a couple who wander New York – first in love,then in hate, then in melancholic,and then resigned love again.Very realistic in lots of way.The song focuses on shattered dreams and sadness mixed with a back ground of Christmas cheer which I feel is a very effective.To be the first Christmas song to avoid the usual traditional sappyness of Christmas songs is pure genius and the only Christmas song that wouldn't make you cringe if you heard it in the middle of summer.It truly deserves the number one spot.I am looking forward to the great music and songs from Irish artists that only an Irish recession can invoke.