Slade’s Noddy Holder Issues Christmas Challenge
FROM WWW.SPINNER.COM:
This time of year, you can’t brave the British Christmas crowds without hearing at least a snippet of Slade’s ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’, the 1973 Yuletide chart-topper which helped make them one of Britain’s favourite bands. In the realm of Christmas number ones, it takes some beating.
As Slade release a festive compilation — ‘Merry Xmas Everybody - Party Hits’ — in time for the festive season, frontman Noddy Holder tells Spinner that the tradition of the Christmas number ones, big-hearted tunes the whole nation could enjoy, is in danger of being snuffed out thanks to ‘The X Factor’. And he makes a promise that may come back to haunt him.
Holder, 63, complains the ‘X Factor’ winner’s song, which in recent times has been the dead cert for Christmas number one, lacks the fun a festive hit should have. “It’s generally some ilk of ballad, some big middle-of-the-road ballad type of song, that they do as their first release. There’s no experimentation at all, there’s nothing new in it. These records they release they could have been released 30 years ago and they would have found a place there just the same.
“They’re not moving forward and they’re not giving off-the-wall acts the chance, they’re all very safe, and middle-of-the-road. The chase for fame overshadows the thirst for music.”
Slade’s own chart-topping Christmas cracker is readily available to download at the click of a mouse — Holder proudly tells Spinner the song always does well in the download charts at this time of year.
Might this be the year the song takes the crown from ‘The X Factor?’ Holder laughs at the thought — then lays down a challenge.
“If ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ beats the ‘X-Factor’ winner to number one, I will stand on top of Broadcasting House and get my c— out for all the world to see.”
Record-buying people of the British Isles, Spinner respectfully says — you know what to do.
