MOJO Bar - Music for the people

Now that the dust has settled on another Christmas, enough time has elapsed for us to discuss the accusation made by many, that the X-Factor has ruined or in some way devalued the haloed battle for the United Kingdoms Christmas number 1. 

The argument runs thus, that by having the Television show reach its end in the weeks running up to the festive period that the X-Factor has got the Christmas  top spot ‘tied up’. That the very gullibility of the British public means that no other artist even has a chance of yuletide glory.

X-Factor has provided us with the last four with the 3rd rendition of Do they know it’s Christmas grabbing top spot in 2004. Here then is a selection spanning the last 40 years. In 2000 Bob the builder was fixing it, ‘99 Cliff Richards Millenium prayer, ‘98 the Spice girls, ‘97 the Teletubbies said Eh Oh, ‘94 East 17, ‘93 Mr Blobby, ‘88 and 90 was Cliff Richard (again). In 1984 the flying Pickets barber shopped their way to the top with only you and in 1980 the St. Winifred’s school choir knocked John Lennon off the top spot with there’s no one quite like Grandma. ”72, Little Jimmy Osmond’s Long haired lover from Liverpool, ‘71 Bennie Hill with Ernie, ‘69 Rolf Harris’s two little boys.

There are some notable exceptions, The Beatles three years running from ‘63 to ‘66, Pink Floyd in ‘79 and Don’t you want me Baby by the Human League over Christmas ‘81 but on the whole an artistically bankrupt lot.

There have been numerous charity singles over the years which we will leave to one side but I think that when you are looking at a list where East 17’s stay another day is a high point, well I think that the British public should have the back of their collective wrists slapped! We are not gullible. We just like rubbish music!

Now I dislike Evil Galactic emperor Cowell as much as the next man but it’s hard to argue that he’s ruined pop music. On the evidence presented above, it was already ruined. and by allowing Hallelujah to be released last year, X-Factor went some way to replenishing Leonard Cohen’s pilfered retirement fund. Based on this, I feel almost magnanimous towards the high trousered one.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 15th, 2009 at 4:28 pm and is filed under News & press. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.