In 1984 Wham! were a band riding high.
Following the success of their debut album Fantastic in 1983, the band went on to Make It Big with an album of the same name in 1984 and a global tour proving that the band had, by this point, done just that.
In guitarist Andrew’s Ridgeley’s book Wham!, George And Me, he writes that the song’s genesis occurred at vocalist George Michael’s parents’ home in Hertfordshire in the summer of 1984.
Having returned to the UK following the band’s global Make It Big tour, the pair had been relaxing, alone in the house, watching football on television when, unbeknown to Ridgeley, the final jigsaw pieces of a tune Michael had been mulling over finally slotted into place within his brain. “Yog sat up, bolt upright and said, I’ve got to go upstairs. I’ve got an idea.’”
Michael retreated alone to his old bedroom to sketch the song out on his keyboard. “I wrote it on one of those little four track portastudios,” he explained in Netflix’s 2023 Wham! Documentary. “Then I went downstairs and I said to Andrew, ‘I’ve done it. We’re going to have four number ones this year. And we’re going to have a Christmas number one and I’ve just written it.’”
Wham! Bam! I have. A plan!
At this point Wham! had already scored their first number one, Wake Me Up Before You Go Go. The debut single from Make It Big had hit the UK top spot a few months earlier in May 1984.
Meanwhile Careless Whisper, a song confusingly issued under the solo George Michael name but also featuring on Wham!’s Make It Big, was about to hit the top spot later that month.
And, as far as Michael saw it, with the next single Freedom already in the chamber (sure enough, a number one in October of that year), the work-in-progress Last Christmas would become their fourth.
“I only had to listen to the demo once to realise that Last Christmas would be a huge hit,” Ridgeley said.
It’s worth bearing in mind that at this point Michael had effectively, by mutual agreement of Ridgeley and their manager Simon Napier Bell, secretly dissolved Wham!, and while Bell harboured hopes of a third album, all three knew that the writing was on the wall.
With the Make It Big tour complete, George Michael about to have his first solo number one and the pressure off, it’s perhaps not surprising that – come August 1984 – Michael was feeling sufficiently off the hook to be even more creative and off-Wham!-brand than usual.
It’s Christmas! Or is it?
Last Christmas is pure textbook Christmas cheese, but behind the scenes it lives an interesting double life.
With lashings of sleigh bells on board, and lyrics referencing a “soul of ice” and perhaps presents being exchanged (“I wrapped it up and sent it”), it clearly IS a Christmas record (with ‘Christmas’ in its title). But it’s not necessarily a Christmas song.
Last Christmas features zero lyrical references to snow, eggnog, elves, tinsel, Santa or any other festive trope. Instead, it’s actually a tale of torment, lost love and a desire to do things differently that could have just as easily been entitled ‘Last August’.
And with the demo complete that afternoon, Michael didn’t delay in creating the song for real. It was recorded in London at Advision Studios just days after it was written, Michael decorating the studio with Christmas decorations in order to inject a little festive cheer into the session taking place at the height of the UK’s summer.
The recording is 100% the work of George Michael without the attendance or input of Ridgeley or Wham! backing singers Pepsi DeMacque and Shirlie Holliman. The only nod to the Wham! band and brand would be the appearance of regular recording and live contributor Deon Estus on bass.
Working alone, Michael recorded and produced the track on a LinnDrum for all the drums and percussion, with all the other parts being played by Michael himself on just one keyboard – a Roland Juno-60. Plus some sleigh bells, obvs. So next time you’re moaning about not having enough gear, think again!
And with third Make It Big single Freedom hitting number one exactly as Michael had predicted, Wham! were all set to finish the year in style.
Raise a glass!
Despite being a band famous for their TV appearances – most specifically their extensively choreographed and energetic performances on the UK’s premier music show Top Of The Pops – it’s still doubtless that the video for Last Christmas comes to mind as soon as you hear those familiar sleigh bells strike.
The video was shot in late November of 1984, in and around a house hired for the occasion in Saas-Fee in the Swiss alps. And while the video shows the band and hangers-on ascending by cable car, the house actually lies at the foot of the mountain, in the village, being easily accessible on foot.
This is, of course, one of the iconic videos of the ’80s, depicting Ridgeley romancing a girl that Michael was – as we see in flashback – intimate with just one year earlier. In that flashback we see Michael gift his girl (model Kathy Hill) a jewelled brooch, only to see Ridgeley wearing the self same brooch at 2:26, meaning that Hill – crucially always depicted as a wicked lady in red throughout – had indulged in a spot of very cheeky regifting: “The very next day, you gave it away,” indeed.
And while Michael’s moody stares across the dining table as Ridgeley steals his sweetheart are pure contrivance for the camera, it’s a fact that Micheal and Ridgeley really did go on holiday to Switzerland with all their mates, stay in a swanky big house together and have a brilliant time. How cool is that?
“Behind the scenes it was a riotous affair,” Ridgeley wrote. “The fact that our friends were there as extras in the video to a surefire Christmas hit single seemed to get lost in their excitement about getting a free holiday. There was an expense account to blow and they were determined to make the most of it.”
Off camera, Michael would grill his fake love interest Hill about the working methods of her then real life boyfriend, the composer Vangelis.
Meanwhile in order to boost the conviviality and visible sense of fun between all those taking part, director Andrew Morahan insisted that the booze being consumed on camera was 100% genuine, with his assistant director instructed to keep all glasses filled to the brim. Cheers!
In attendance for what was essentially a mates’ piss-up masquerading as a music video were Wham! regulars Pepsi and Shirlie plus other band members and lifelong friends such as David Austin (who carries in the yuletide logs at 1:29), the duo’s old schoolmate and regular moral supporter of the band, and who fronted a Michael co-written and produced single Turn To Gold which reached number 68 in June 1984.
And while Shirlie Holliman’s boyfriend and future husband Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet was in attendance, he doesn’t actually appear in the video, avoiding the theft of any limelight by dipping out of its snowy frolics.
The video is also remarkable in that it’s the very last time that Michael was seen sans beard, with his solo reinvention set in motion after its completion.
And so with a six-month masterplan coming to its conclusion and with much audio and visual perfection in the can, surely nothing could stop Wham! attaining their fourth number one…
But then disaster struck. Literally.
At Christmas time, it’s hard…
We’ve covered the genesis, creation and success of charity single Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas before, and suffice to say that Bob Geldof’s star-powered juggernaut sweeping aside all in its path and stealing the top spot for Christmas was inevitable from the moment that he and Midge Ure dreamed up the idea.
And when Geldof came calling, asking for Michael’s participation on the track, effectively asking him to willingly step aside and pass up his number one, the ever magnanimous Michael was proud to offer his services.
That said, you can still sense glimmers of Michael’s regret and the dawning of his six-month masterplan’s demise throughout the BBC’s Band Aid: The Making of Do They Know It’s Christmas documentary. You can practically see his dream slipping away as he chats to Bob Geldof’s partner and later wife, UK music TV mainstay Paula Yates.
“The song’s really catchy,” he ruefully admits, “a major threat to our fourth number one.”
“What’s your next single?” Yates asks.
“It’s called Last Christmas,” replies Michael.
“Is it very Christmassy?” Yates probes.
“Very,” replies an increasingly crestfallen Michael, before consoling himself that all might not be lost.
“I don’t mind which gets to number one,” he offers – lying.
“It might be that everyone can have a go?” suggests Yates.
Visibly cheered by this prospect, Micheal agrees. “That would be great, that might be what happens. This [Band Aid] will go in at number one, so hopefully we’ll have a bash,” he assures himself.
Unfortunately, George Michael’s Christmas wish was not to come true.
Sure enough, as he suspected, both records entered the chart on 9 December 1984 with Do They Know It’s Christmas? outselling Last Christmas two to one. Darn.
Incredibly, despite the setback, and ever the gent, rather than bear a grudge, Michael instead gifted all proceeds from Last Christmas in perpetuity to the Band Aid charity, effectively contributing an additional third to its £8 million first year profits.
But it wasn't lights out for Last Christmas just yet. Ever eager to please their fans, the Wham! team had carefully packed a secret weapon on board their festive launch.
Their ultimate Christmas jaunt was actually a double-A-side with the excellent (and completely sleigh bell-free) Everything She Wants – probably the best thing that Wham! ever did – slyly secreted on its reverse.
This meant that once the big day had passed (and songs with Christmas themes would traditionally plummet), Last Christmas could be flipped on the radio, fire its second-stage booster and rocket back up the charts.
But Michael’s dream of a fourth number one only ever slipped further away as sales for Do They Know It’s Christmas? only ever snowballed, holding Last Christmas at number two for five weeks in total and extending its winning streak far into January of the following year.
Last Christmas did eventually outsell Do They Know It’s Christmas?, clinging on to number eight with Band Aid at number nine on the charts of 20 January 1985. But by this time, any hope of the track hitting number one had long since slipped away.
(It’s worth saying that in Ireland, at least, Last Christmas did successfully beat Do They Know It’s Christmas? to number one on its first week of release, giving up the top slot for that all-important Christmas week before winning it back again at the end of December).
And there was more bad news.
“Tell me baby, do you recognise me?”
Following Last Christmas’ release and number one failure, the song was to have another set back.
Spotting the song’s use of its innately obvious chord sequence – D, B minor, E minor, A – the writers of Barry Manilow’s Can’t Smile Without You chanced their arm. Contesting the originality of Michael’s composition and claiming plagiarism, it fell to a musicologist to throw out the claim by citing 60 further previous songs that used the same sequence.
For us, however, it’s always the writers of Kool And The Gang’s Joanna, released a whole year earlier, that should have been making the call… Close your eyes and summon up a few mental sleigh bells over this one:
Still not getting it? Try this...
Number one with a mullet?
So did Michael get his much craved-for fourth number one? Eventually, yes… But that track was Edge Of Heaven, Wham!’s final single, released to officially mark the duo’s split and which held the number one slot for two weeks over a year later, in June 1986.
Last Christmas would however, impressively, go on to chart again in 1985 and 1986, reaching numbers 2 and 14 respectively, then disappear, unreleased, until 2007 after which it has mercifully charted every year since.
So is there a happy ending?
Previously well known as the UK’s highest-selling single never to reach number one (with over 2m physical sales to date), Last Christmas did finally reach the the number one slot on 1 January 2021, meaning that it took 36 years from its original release to finally make it – a new record.
However, this dream finally coming true was something George Michael never lived to see. Michael passed away on 25 December 2016 (with Last Christmas at number 16 and climbing to number seven the following week).
In 2022, Last Christmas returned to the number one spot on 16 December and the 30th December but – once again – devilishly missed out on that elusive Christmas number one accolade in between, thanks to Lad Baby’s Food Aid.
Mercifully, 2023 held better news and Last Christmas finally won Christmas number one – the prize for which it was penned – when it held the top spot across Christmas in 2023, seven years after Michael’s death and 39 years after its release.
“Last Christmas has finally ascended to the much-cherished and sought-after official Christmas number one, which was always the main goal,” Andrew Ridgeley told the Official UK Charts. “George would be beside himself. After all these years, finally to attain the Christmas number one. It would be mission accomplished – that was the challenge and the goal he set for himself and it was a huge disappointment when it didn’t make it, because in our opinion it was nailed on."
Happy Christmas!
