I forgot all about listening to the charts last night on Radio 1, a ritual that used to have kids running to the nearest radio and staying put for three hours while they listened and taped their favourite songs. Although record sales are still measured and reported on every Sunday teatime, I am not sure that anyone really gives a shit about it these days. Decent songs very rarely make it into the charts, and the kids have so many ways of listening to music I can’t see how ‘proper’ radio makes an impact on teenagers. My daughter for example hates the radio I listen to (and quite rightly so, we’re not supposed to take musical recommendations from our parents) and used to insist on having Capital FM on so we could listen to the same six songs on a loop punctuated with adverts. Looking at Twitter and Facebook last night, I didn’t see an enormous amount of mentions of the charts apart from the official X-Factor Twitter account (yes I follow it, I like to occasionally keep up with popular culture).

The reason that yesterday’s chart was significant is simply because of the announcement of the Christmas number one. Over the years this has become less exciting and evidentially less of an event. A uniquely British obsession, this was once the ultimate prize for a pop star and a special effort was made to try and achieve the festive top spot, these days like most Christmas traditions it has faded into nothingness. Christmas number one as a part of the festive package hit its peak (after a few years in the wilderness) in 2009 with ‘Killing in the Name’ by Rage Against The Machine being downloaded to the top thanks to Jon Morter’s Facebook campaign. This was the last time the entire nation listened with interest to see if the evil reign of X-Factor could be toppled, and it could; fuck you Simon Cowell, we won’t buy what you tell me.

I’ve already written how this led to overkill and watered down the whole anti-X-Factor ethos so that it hasn’t been as easy ever since. My prediction in 2007 that the change in the rules could be used for mischief was met with blank looks of bewilderment as people didn’t really know what a download was back then. Having said that, the 2007 Christmas chart looked pretty much as it has done ever since.

Sadly the over egging of the download against Cowell pudding has had the opposite effect and this cleared the way for Ben Haenow, this year’s X-Factor winner, to reach the top with ease. (How it didn’t occur to the puppet masters to make him cover ‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’ is a mystery that might never be solved). A glance at this week’s charts reveals that people have been downloading, with ‘Fairytale Of New York’, ‘All I Want For Christmas’, ‘Last Christmas’ (download my interpretation of it here for free or pay what you like), ‘I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday’, ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas’ (the new version and the ‘proper’ 1984 original), ‘Merry Christmas Everyone’, ‘Driving Home For Christmas’, Merry Christmas Everybody’, ‘Rocking Around The Christmas Tree’ (the Brenda Lee version), ‘It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year’, ‘Stay Another Day’ (not technically a Christmas song in my opinion), and  ‘Step Into Christmas’ all in the lower reaches of the Top 100, and Dean Martin’s version of ‘Let It Snow’ at 100. As most people own these songs already I can only assume that this came as a result of people making party playlists quickly and cheaply, but it all counts.

The cover version of ‘All Together Now’ by Peace Collective unfortunately only makes it to number 70, Iron Maiden have entered straight in at 44 which I’m surprised at given how this song was this year’s big Facebook presence but that goes to show how the apathy has set in. My biggest shock after what I said in this blog is that John Otway failed to make the chart at all with his Christmas effort when he is not so much a cult figure as a cult leader who can bring on the most shocking results from his fans.

We can still topple Cowell and bring back the festive charts and the return of Christmas number one excitement, but we need to concentrate our efforts on the one song if it’s going to work again.

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