Express & Star

Slade Christmas hit voted nation's favourite festive number one

While Stormzy and LadBaby battle it our for this year's Christmas number one, Slade's festive hit has been voted the nation's favourite Christmas song that hit the top spot.

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Slade performing

A survey carried our by ROXi revealed that the Wolverhampton band's 1973 hit Merry Xmas Everybody is the UK's most popular Christmas song since records began in 1952.

Slade’s hit is most popular with older generations with 21 per cent of over 55s who voted for a Christmas song agreeing it’s the best Christmas chart topper ever.

Meanwhile 21 per cent of people in the South West, Scotland and Wales have the most love for the tune.

The cities of Cardiff with 26 per cent and Glasgow with 25 per cent are craziest for Noddy Holder’s tune written to cheer up Britain in the wake of the early ‘70’s economic slump and miner’s strike of 1972.

Only the people of Nottingham think Queen’s 1975 Christmas cracker Bohemian Rhapsody was superior than Slade’s hit with 13 per cent of the city voting for the band.

Meanwhile 13 per cent of friends living together as housemates thought Band Aid’s 1984 Christmas classic Do They Know It’s Christmas? was the best number one of Christmas.

Band Aid’s hit is also the only song to make it into the all-time top 10 list three times, with the original 1984 version written by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure in response to the 1983-85 famine in Ethiopia, proving the most popular.

Ed Sheeran’s 2017 chart topping song Perfect is the only tune written this century in the UK’s Top 10 Christmas number one list with 3 per cent of the vote.

The song was penned by Ed about finding love with his then future wife Cherry Seaborn who he’d previously known from his school days.

East 17 also make the Top 10 list with their 1994 hit Stay Another Day. The band’s songwriter Tony Mortimer has just released a rerecorded version of the song with Waltham Forest Youth Choir 25 years on from its original release.

Children’s TV is responsible for some of the worst Christmas hits ever released according to the new survey.

Noel Edmonds’ pink and yellow spotted creation Mr Blobby is the most hated Christmas number one of all time with his self-titled 1993 hit Mr Blobby.

A huge 18 per cent of people who voted for their worst Christmas number one in Northern Ireland, Belfast and Nottingham expressed their loathing for the song; a higher rate than anywhere else in the UK.

The lowest measure of dislike for the song meanwhile came from 16 to 24 year olds, a mere 1 per cent of whom hated the song.

Meanwhile, more men than women find Rolf Harris’ 1969 hit Two Little Boys the worst Christmas chart topper.

The highest levels of dislike to the disgraced Children’s TV entertainer’s hit record comes from the East of England with 11 per cent of people from that area calling it out as their least favourite Christmas number one

Harry Belafonte’s 1957 Christmas number one Mary's Boy Child is voted one of the best and also the worst Christmas number ones ever.

Overall Mary's Boy Child attracted more people who thought it was one of their worst Christmas number ones than those who thought it was one of the top 10 Best Christmas tunes with 16 per cent of those voting for their worst Christmas number one voting for Belafonte.

Can We Fix It? By Bob The Builder is the most recent song to make it into the top 10 worst Christmas number ones after hitting the top spot in Christmas 2000 at sixth place.

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