Tim: We might not be featuring current Christmas tracks every day, but BOY are there a lot of goodies from the past. We’ve featured Nova a few times before – she’s off Sweden – but missed this when it came out a few years back. Which is a shame, because it holds up very well as a Christmas song and as a pop song.
Tom: It’s rare that I actually dislike a track so much I have to stop listening, Tim, but at the first chorus — specifically the line “that’s my perfect Christmas”, I had to. And then I realised this isn’t the first time I’ve done that: somehow I heard this on the radio while driving through the US recently. (Heaven knows why, they usually just play the same ten tracks on repeat.)
Tim: WOW, that is fantastic. And sure, the lyrics are a bit damp and melty in places, and I’m never all that keen on “all I want is peace” because I’m fairly sure in a high number of cases that’s somewhat bullshit, especially for a teenager, as she was.
Tom: Damp and melty? If I didn’t know this was a proper release, I’d assume the lyrics were either written by a four-year-old or written by an adult trying to parody the horrible overly-saccharine Christmas ballads. I’ve not had a song properly wind me up like this in a long while.
Tim: Oh, you are SO WELCOME. That “ring out the love, our hearts are uniting” is a fantastic line musically, no-one can dispute the inherent festivity–
Tom: YES I CAN
Tim: –FINE, but also the message at the end of the middle eight does come across as genuinely heartfelt and lovely.
Tom: I wouldn’t know, I didn’t get that far.
Tim: All in all, I really do like this track. Although, yeah, I slightly understand if you don’t.