George Michael - December Song (I Dreamed Of Christmas)



It's so sad to have heard that George Michael has passed away, on Christmas Day too! Unfortunately, I have already reviewed Wham!'s "Last Christmas", where George Michael was one-half of the duo, in my Christmas Special 2012. So I googled to see if he had released another Christmas song to finish off my Christmas Special 2016, and this one came up. It's a great vocal from George Michael, and it's sad to hear that this legend of a voice has gone from this world. He was also a brilliant gay idol and LGBT activist. This is the second George Michael animation music video; "December Song (I Dreamed Of Christmas)" easily represents the festive date as well as love and lights from a child's perspective.

George Michael, real name Georgios Panayiotou, is one of the biggest male artists in the world. Not only has he had his singles and albums in his duo Wham! but he also did amazingly solo and quickly became a legend. So many people know his songs that it's difficult just to think of one favourite from him. This song was another Christmas song he released recently, then he later performed it on The X Factor. The song was planned for the Spice Girls, but personally, I believe, it sounds so much better from George Michael himself. It charted at number 14 in the UK, but shops sold out of the physical CD so it could've charted higher if they had stocked up more. "December Song (I Dreamed Of Christmas)" was written by George Michael and David Austin.

As previously mentioned, the music video is George Michael's second animated music video, after "Shoot The Dog". It depicts George Michael as a child, who walks through a TV.

It describes a child's representation of Christmas, all wrapped up in quite a sad and lonely way. Since there is only a mother in the whole video, maybe he is thinking of his dad? Who knows?

Inside the TV, we watch him have a snowball fight with a panda, and ride some light bulbs that have wheels on. All the while, his mouse or hamster follows him with every step; mainly in a comedic way.

Towards the end, the child falls from a great height, but luckily he wakes up in his bed; there are presents under the tree, and his mother gives him a cuddle. It's quite dreary, and sad, although the reason why isn't clear. However, it's still quite adorable.
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Wham! - Last Christmas

Wham! was a band consisting of four members back in 1981. They were George Michael, Andrew Ridgeley, Pepsi Damacque and Shirlie Holliman. They gained a lot of success, but disbanded in 1986, however their reputation and their hit singles still live on.

"Last Christmas" was written by George Michael. It managed to chart at number two in the UK Singles Chart, being beaten by Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas?" However since 1984 it has charted during various other years. It charted in 1985, 1986, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 at positions of 6, 45, 14, 26, 34, 57 and 26. The song has been covered by a number of artists who have also been included in my blog, these are: Cascada's "Last Christmas" and Joe McElderry's "Last Christmas". I don't doubt that their will be more in the future.

This music video is another top music video, and reminds me a lot of Justin Bieber's "Mistletoe". It has a similar Christmas-esque to them both, which makes them similar.

This is narrative based, with a few performance bits. The story is that George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley meet up at a ski resort with their girlfriends. It becomes evident that Andrew's girlfriend used to be with George and this song is aimed at her.

I like the flashback, it's extremely inventive and shows what happened last Christmas. The backing singers Pepsi Damacque and Shirlie Holliman appear in this video alongside Martin Kemp (who was Shirlie's boyfriend and her future husband).

Overall this is one of my favourite songs. The video isn't my favourite, but I think that is due it being an old music video (older than me). On the other hand I have nothing to complain about and nothing against this video, and so I have no choice but give this top rating, because this video does deserve it.

New Release: Joe McElderry - Last Christmas

I was struggling for what to do for New Release, since it's my Christmas week Special, I needed a new release that coincided with Christmas but which also had a music video. I wanted to do Stacey Solomon's "Driving Home For Christmas" however there isn't a music video for it, which is quite worrying,, so after looking at all the others I didn't have a clue what to do, since some doesn't have a link with Christmas, whereas others did but didn't have a music video. This one was a last resort, due to the fact that this is quite short, so probably doesn't count much as a music video, and also hasn't made the iTunes top 1000 downloads as of yet, so could this suggest that this song isn't going to chart?

Joe McElderry won The X Factor back in 2009. His competitors, who have also managed to release songs and become quite known were, Olly Murs (second), Stacey Solomon (third), Danyl Johnson (fourth), Lloyd Daniels (fifth), Jedward (sixth), Jamie Archer now in band Archer (seventh). Joe McElderry has gone up against his former competitor Stacey Solomon this week to see who will get the highest chart position, and if iTunes is anything to go by Stacey Solomon has totally won. After just one album, Joe was released from his contract with Syco, and was then launched into Popstar to Operastar, which he won. Now, under Decca Records, Joe has released 2 albums, one of which got to Number two on the UK Albums chart, which is his highest album chart position to date.

This song is a cover of Wham!'s well known single "Last Christmas". Joe is not the only artist releasing this song this week, as a matter of fact, The Only Way Is Essex (TOWIE) cast has released this single too (and their single is in the iTunes chart, so where is Joe?) The song was written by George Michael, and has been covered a number of times, including Cascada, Billie Piper and The Crazy Frog. It doesn't look like Joe has a chance of getting into the chart this week, which is unfortunate as he is a really good singer, which is why he has won two singing competitions so far.

The music video is quite short, would I call it a music video? I'm not sure, it is short and I bet the song on "Classic Christmas" or even on the single, is much longer than this. It suggests that this could merely be an advertisement for his album, but for the time being we're going to presume it's a music video.

It's got a lot to do with Christmas, and I like the use of the snow, it makes it even more celebratory, will we have a white Christmas this year? We've had a bit of snow, so it's always possible... It also looks like Joe is having a Christmas party, but all he is doing is singing rather than having conversations with his friends and family.

There is no relationship with the song and the video, for all we know this music video could have been given to any of his songs on his album, as there is no narrative whatsoever. Also some of the time, Joe is singing and his lips are moving at the wrong time so the music doesn't quite match up. This is heightened right at the end, because what he is singing in the video and what he is singing on the track are different.

Overall this looks like a very simple music video, with not a lot happening and not much of a link to the song. It could have been a lot better, and they could have at least matched what he is saying up to the track a lot better. It's an okay music video but I really don't think it is that good, therefore my rating isn't that high.