Cheap Christmas Presents & Gift Ideas: Christmas Songs, Music & Soundtracks

Well there's been a whole load of Christmas songs that have hit the charts in the past 30/40 years. There seems to be a major competition these days - unfortunately Christmas songs have turned into a competition of who can sell the most and not who can produce the best Christmas song - in 2008 will it be Ruth Jones with the Gavin & Stacy version of Islands in the Stream?.

The top selling songs are typically the ones that have been re-released over and over again! These include Band Aid's 'Do They Know It's Christmas?' which was released in 1984, 1985 and again in 2007. Wham! released 'Last Christmas' in the same years whilst Slade seem t re-release the songs every year as they have done in 1973, 1981, 1983, 1998, 2006 and 2007; whilst John Lennon & Yoko Ono released 'Happy Christmas (War Is Over) in 1972, 1980, 1981, 2003 & 2007.

Mary's Boy Child was released twice. The first was by Harry Belafonte in 1957 and is the fourth biggest selling Christmas song of all time. It was re-released in 1978 by Boney M and at the time was the biggest selling Christmas song - it was supparsed by Band Aid with 'Do They Know It's Christmas?'.

There's just loads of Christmas CDs to buy. In fact the find4me site (maybe not the best) lists over 1,000 Christmas cds! Including, Songs For Christmas for £4, Karaoke Christmas for £4.99, Celtic Christmas also for £4.99. The major retailers such as Choices UK, Woolworths, Amazon, CD WOW, Power Play Direct, and Play.com and Zavvi have great Christmas music to buy.

The best Christmas compilation album we can find is the Now That's What I Call Xmas by Virgin Television from Woolworths for £13.99. It has a massive list of great Christmas songs! Any pub, club, bar or work place should not be seen without it! The songs are:

Happy Xmas (War Is Over).
Do They Know It's Christmas? (1984 Original Version).
Fairytale Of New York.Step Into Christmas.
Merry Xmas Everybody.Wonderful Christmas Time.
Christmas Wrapping.
Frosty The Snowman.
Jingle Bells.
Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!.
The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas To You).
White Christmas.Do They Know It's Christmas?.
The Power Of Love.All I Want For Christmas Is You.
Santa Baby.
Stop The Cavalry.
Not Tonight Santa.
Ring Out Solstice Bells.
We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
In The Bleak Midwinter.
Gaudete.
Silent Night Holy Night.
While Shepherds Watched.
Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer.
The Twelve Days Of Christmas.
Little Town.O Come, All Ye Faithful.
Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.
The Perfect Year.
Winter Melody.
Christmas Day.
Last Christmas.
It May Be Winter Outside (But In My Heart It's Spring).
Baby, It's Cold Outside.
Home For Christmas.
Happy New Year.
Peace.
Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy.
Winter Wonderland.
Driving Home For Christmas.
Saviour's Day.
Lonely This Christmas.
A Winter's Tale.
A Spaceman Came Travelling.
Walking In The Air.
(Everybody's Waitin' For) The Man With The Bag.
Swinging On A Star.
Never Do A Tango With An Eskimo.
Jingle Bell Rock.
Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree.
Lonely Pup (In A Christmas Shop).
Mary's Boy Child.
Mistletoe And Wine.
Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.
What Christmas Means To Me.
Little Saint Nick.
In Dulce Jubilo.
I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday.
I Believe In Father Christmas

If you haven't heard these songs before (com'on!) or would like to hear them again, you can with YouTube - I'm not sure about copyright issues, however! I know videos are removed if they are illegal - so I'm using the mighty Google to remove them if they shouldn't be on!

Band Aid - Do they know it's Christmas