Friday 28 November 2008

"It's Beginning To Feel a Lot Like Christmas..."

It’s time to get out the ‘Sleigh List’... those songs which only work at this particular time of year, but are like an old friend you haven’t seen for a while and welcome with open arms! (Mind you, after spending a few weeks with them, you’re quite happy not to see them again for another year...)

It’s always interesting to discuss with radio stations when do the Christmas songs start? What’s on the list? How fast do we turn them around? Do we still have to play Wham! (Answer: Yes we do!)

The great thing is that there are increasingly more and more Christmas records around, especially from many mainstream core artists who have probably recorded a version of their favourite Christmas song. Searching these out and giving them a spin always freshens up the Sleigh List, and can provide a nice talking point on-air. My favourite cover of a Christmas classic is Coldplay doing a version of The Pretenders ‘2000 Miles’ (which I know isn't the most well known Christmas record across Europe).
If you haven’t heard the Coldplay version, let me know and I can point you in the right direction ;-)

It’s really simple and has a ‘standout’ production feel on the track so if your station plays lots of Coldplay, then why not give this a few spins?

We all know about stations that flip their format for December and go 100% Christmas songs, so in the spirit of the season, let me recommend one to you. Client station Radio 100FM in Denmark run a soft AC station in Copenhagen, appropriately titled ‘Radio Soft’. Their Christmas format that they’ve just flipped to always proves really popular in Copenhagen and lots of shops tune in and play it out in-store as it’s a much better alternative to rotating the “Now That’s What I Call Christmas” CD 10 times a day.

Their resident ‘Father Christmas’, Head of Music Martin Marx has been wearing his white beard for a few weeks now and putting together a really good bunch of festive treats.

Give it a listen and tell me you don’t feel Christmassy after tuning in for 10 minutes!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Gosh! Just as I hit the listen button they're playing Silent Night... makes my eyes fill up!!