What's your favourite Christmas song?

Mariah belting out 'All I Want for Christmas is You?', Wham's 'Last Christmas' or Shakin' Steven's denim-clad-classic 'Merry Christmas Everyone'?

Well, since you ask, mine is ‘Fairytale of New York’ by The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl.

My husband can never get his head around this, and always says “But it’s not jolly.  You can’t have a Christmas song that’s not jolly!”

But I believe that a Christmas song doesn’t need to be happy and, in fact, is all the better for not being.

Before you put me in the Grinch category, let me explain.  I think that this song serves as a reminder that not everybody will be having a happy yuletide. 

Personally, it’s at this time of year when I particularly think of homeless people, struggling to stay warm in sub-zero temperatures. 

Or elderly people with no family to visit, lonely and alone. 

Or the bereaved, where Christmas highlights their loss. 

Not everyone will be having a ‘Perry Como' or 'Bing Crosby’ Christmas, and that’s what this song is saying.

So whilst I wish everyone a Merry Christmas, I ask you to spare a thought for those less fortunate while you listen to the dulcet tones of Shane McGowan and co singing the best Christmas song ever. 

Altogether now:

“And the boys of the NYPD choir were singing Galway Bay,

And the bells were ringing out for Christmas Day.”