Stacey Solomon
Driving Home For Christmas (Conehead)
There's nothing not to love about this song. The resurrection of one of Chris "Traffic News" Rea's Top Two car songs. The artwork, completely unfestive, almost as if flung together in two minutes. The idea that if Stacey did drive home for Christmas she would probably arrive four hours late with a half-defrosted prawn ring on the back seat and dents all down one side of the car. (The "alternative" version of this, released as a bonus track, is extremely lovely.)
Leo Sayer
Coming Home For Christmas (Cooking Vinyl)
Like the Stacey Solomon single, but less specific in terms of transport.
Delilah
Love You So (Atlantic)
This song's video is a bit embarrassing in a Del Rey-ja-vu sort of way, so focus instead on the fact that despite being the sort of artist it is only possible to get excited about if one works at a major record label, New Boring "chanteuse" Delilah turns in a mightily listenable follow-up to Go, opting for an elegant mood piece. Sadly, not remotely festive so it cannot be Pick Of The Week. A simple Love You Snow remix would have sufficed.
She & Him
Christmas Day (Double Six)
They might as well have called this unpleasant-on-the-ear tritefest Hipster Christmas and be done with it. The album from which Christmas Day comes can be ordered in a bundle with mittens and a knitted hat. So knowing! Here is the news, She & Him: acknowledging you are something – in this case a glorified novelty act – does not mean you are not that. It means you are that and are brazen about it. BRAZEN. And the only brazen I want at Christmas is the sort that keeps my turkey moist.
Emmy The Great & Tim Wheeler
Home For The Holidays (Infectious)
This song was written last Christmas in East Grinstead, the UK's answer to Twin Peaks, the home of Scientology and, as of this year, the town in which Peter Andre opted to open his first coffee shop. In many ways Emmy & Tim are the non-American answer to She & Him, the key difference being that their single isn't unlistenable horseshit and is, in fact, splendid.
Rizzle Kicks
Mama Do The Hump (Universal/Island)
This may not at first glance appear to be particularly festive and you might even be thinking Rizzle Kicks are attempting to sneak this single into the charts in a relatively easy chart week but you would be wrong on at least one of those counts because the Three Kings arrived to the nativity upon camels, beasts known for their humped backs. On the Rizzleometer this is hardly Down With The Trumpets, but nor does it have Olly Murs on it, and a Murs-free Christmas is the greatest gift of all. Something the king who didn't bring gold or frankincense would have done well to remember.
The Only Way Is Essex
Last Christmas (Globe)
Shut up.
