How Slade saved Xmas

and cemented our obsession with festive number ones

- MATT ROPER

On December 13, 1973, the nation tuned in to hear Edward Heath deliver a message no one wanted just before Christmas.

The Tory PM warned of “a great emergency” facing the country.

The lights were going out, miners were on strike, oil prices were soaring after conflict in the Middle East, and families were bracing themselves for the hardest Christmas since the war.

Street lamps were dimmed. Electric heaters were banned from offices. TV finished at 10.30pm. Blackouts plunged homes into darkness.

It was bleak. The country needed an injection of joy. Enter Slade...

As Heath's sombre address landed, the Kent Evening Post ran a story about a new Christmas record selling out across the country.

“Merry Christmas. Keep smiling. Things aren't as bad as they seem,” it said, paraphrasing the rockers’ lyrics for Merry Xmas Everybody.

It went on: “To go around singing that in the middle of the energy crisis and strike threats, you have to be mad - or a member of the Slade pop group.”

But while the lights were going out, record shops were selling out. Then came Wizzard's glitter-soaked I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday and Elton John's Step Into Christmas.

Suddenly December 1973 didn't feel quite so miserable after all. By mid-December, Slade’s hit had smashed straight in at No1. By Christmas Day, it had sold more than a million copies.