Shane MacGowan’s widow has insisted she and the singer “loved” George Michael – despite Wham! beating The Pogues’ ‘Fairytale of New York’ to the Christmas No1 spot.
Victoria Mary Clarke – who was by Shane’s side when he died aged 65 on 30 November after suffering a string of illnesses including pneumonia – saw his iconic festival classic fail to claim the honour due to late performer George’s group’s ‘Last Christmas’ hit landing it
Amid Pogues’ fans huge disappointment, she said on X alongside a link to the Wham! track: “I love Wham!!! We loved George.”
Wham! claimed the top spot on 22 December for the first time after 39 years.
It made history as having the longest-ever journey to the UK Christmas Number One, after being held off from reaching the top when it was original released in 1984 by Band Aid’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’.
Victoria had been backing a campaign to get ‘Fairytale; to the top, telling BBC Radio 4 she was “very much in favour” of the track topping the charts – adding: “It would be nice, wouldn’t it? It should be the Christmas number one. It absolutely should.”
Wham!’s Andrew Ridgeley, 60, said about ‘Last Christmas’ getting to No1:
“George would be beside himself after all of these years, (that we have) finally obtained Christmas Number One.
“Yog (George’s nickname) said that he wrote Last Christmas with the intention of writing a Christmas Number One. It’s mission accomplished!”
‘Last Christmas’ was streamed 13.3 million times in the week leading up to it claiming the top spot, according to the Official Charts Company.
It made it the most-streamed Christmas Number 1 ever during Christmas week.
Along with ‘Last Christmas’ and ‘Fairytale’, contenders for this year’s festive No1 included Sam Ryder’s ‘You’re Christmas to Me’ and Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas is You’.