The second of three Christmas songs to feature in the blog this December, we’re moving onto a favourite for so many: the classic Driving Home for Christmas, by the wonderful Chris Rea.
The artist
A fellow north-eastern lad (he was born in Middlesbrough in 1951), Chris was heavily influenced by classic blues music and bought his first guitar in his early-twenties. He was a member of a few local bands during the early-mid seventies, before securing a record deal as a solo artist. He released his first solo album, Whatever Happened to Benny Santini, in 1978, and continued to release albums on pretty much a yearly basis into the mid-eighties, achieving some degree of success in mainland Europe, though he found the UK market harder to crack. That changed in 1985, when he released the million-selling Shamrock Diaries, featuring the hit singles Stainsby Girls and Josephine. This was essentially the catalyst for a hugely successful decade or so, which cemented Rea’s status as one of the UK’s most popular recording artists. The albums On The Beach (1986) and Dancing With Strangers (1987) were both million-sellers, with the latter featuring what was his biggest charting UK single to date – the wonderful Let’s Dance, which reached number 12. His tenth solo album saw his career become truly stratospheric: 1989’s The Road To Hell hit number 1 in the UK album charts and went on to be certified as 6 x platinum. Hit albums such as Auberge and God’s Great Banana Skin swiftly followed, before severe health issues affected him in the mid-90s. Thankfully, he recovered and began recording much more bluesy albums when he returned to the studio. A stroke in 2016 affected Rea badly and, whilst he did release some new music following his partial recovery, he is understandably no longer as prolific as he used to be. However, his huge, varied and fantastic back-catalogue means he will always be rated as one of the finest British singer/songwriter/guitarists of the past 40-50 years.
Why I’ve chosen to write about this song
I have two Chris Rea Christmas options from the 80s to choose from. The other, Joys of Christmas, is a song I love, though it presents a very different interpretation of the festive season from the usual Christmas classics. Describing a quintessentially British working-class Christmas during the Thatcher era of the early 80s, it’s downbeat, raw, honest, and quite brilliant. However, seeing as though it will undoubtedly send at least 90% of you into a spiral of misery and depression, I’ve opted for the crowd-pleaser instead (Joys of Christmas can wait another year or two before featuring here). And who doesn’t love Driving Home for Christmas? It’s just a huge, warm, bearhug of a song. Evoking memories of a bygone age, it just makes me smile and appreciate the truly important elements of Christmas – human relationships, love, and togetherness.
The video
A bit of a tricky one, this. There weren’t really any official videos for the song, until a version was released in 2009 for the charity Shelter. Rea himself stated ‘I wanted to do something special this Christmas and what better way than to help keep a roof over people’s heads when they need it most – at Christmas. By teaming up with Shelter, we can hopefully make a difference.’ The video features a list of not exactly A-list celebs from the time – Mike Read, David Hamilton, Martin Shaw, Kristian Digby, Gail Porter, Lizzie Cundy, Ewen MacIntosh, Carol Decker, Gile Vickers-Jones (no – me neither…), and Lionel Blair probably didn’t have busy schedules and, whilst it’s admirable that they got involved, I think the subsequent video is bloody awful, hence why I’ve chosen this one instead. A lyric video from the official Chris Rea YouTube channel, there is some lovely imagery here.
The stats
The song was first released as a B-side to Rea’s 1986 single Hello Friend. A newly recorded version featured as one of two new songs on his 1988 hits compilation New Light Through Old Windows and was subsequently released as a single in November 1988, where it peaked at number 53 on the UK singles chart. Not exactly a chart smash, and a prime example of a Christmas song which has become much more popular over the years. It has featured in the UK singles chart every year since 2007, largely thanks to the increasing popularity of downloads and digital streaming, and achieved it’s highest position of 10 in the 31st December 2021 chart. However, in a 2012 ITV special, it was voted as the twelfth most popular Christmas song of all time, which illustrates just how loved the song is these days.
For the stats fans, the Christmas number one when this first charted in 1988 was Cliff Richard’s Mistletoe and Wine, whilst the Christmas number one when the song hit its peak position in 2021 was Ladbaby’s Sausage Rolls For Everyone, featuring Ed Sheeran and Elton John (in an incredibly generous move which pushed their festive tune, Merry Christmas, down to the number two slot).
The cover version
I have to be honest – I wasn’t aware of any covers of this song, so I’ve done some research. And, having trawled through a Spotify list of over 300 versions, I’ve decided not to include any here. Each one I listened to sounded the same, none of them did anything even remotely differently, and there’s therefore no need to share anything here but the brilliant original. I love the cover version section of this blog, though I’ll only share something if there’s an alternative version which does something for me. Sadly, that isn’t the case here.
The wrap-up
Yes, it’s an obvious choice. Yes, you’ve probably heard it a hundred times already over the past few weeks. Yes, we all hit a point where we’re had enough of Christmas songs (even those of us who adore them). But that time isn’t now, and you can never get enough of a classic like this, so make a brew (or some hot chocolate, or mulled wine), settle into your favourite chair, grab a mince pie or three, smile, and sing your way through this wonderful song. I don’t care that it doesn’t feature any of the Rea signature slide guitar licks which I love so much – this is still a beautiful, timeless song. Enjoy!
Best wishes.
Mick
