the ideal Christmas #1 would be a newly released Christmas-themed pop song that joins the list of Christmas classics, but that's probably not going to happen again for a while as we've so internalised the current canon and even though you occasionally get new ones that do well in the charts they're always outpaced by the campaign. I don't know what the last one under those conditions would be that I like... 'Stay Another Day' perhaps, as it's somehow now a Christmas song.

 

failing that a campaign for the right reasons, especially good with RATM as it was organically created, original and fun.

 

It almost happened last year with the Ed & Elton song, so it will happen at some point. I think it's more likely to happen these days actually, because more new Christmas songs are recorded these days. Plus the new ones get an advantage from not being on ACR. So we'll probably get another one like that Ellie Goulding one sneaking it by being top of the Amazon playlist.

 

For me, Perfect was the last decent Christmas No.1, it gets a hard time but I think it's a fantastic ballad. Rockabye was a 10/10 song too and just such a surprise Christmas chart topper, as it had already been at No.1 for so long, weird no viable charity contenders came out that year.

'Perfect' is not exactly my favourite Ed Sheeran song (I think it's slightly redundant in his discography when it's basically just a somewhat inferior retread of 'Thinking Out Loud') but it certainly fits the bill for the last 'decent' Christmas #1. The last one I really love is Rage Against The Machine still lol. So just barely had one genuinely great Xmas #1 during my time on this site... not sure what the prospects are for the next one, this year is already a write-off for me again even if Wham! manage to pull it off because I've never really cared much for 'Last Christmas' anyway, though I'd obviously take it over the sausage roll grifter.