Originally begun in 1985, the song had a troubled two-year development history, undergoing rewrites and aborted attempts at recording, and losing its original female vocalist along the way, before finally being completed in August 1987. It was originally released as a single on 23 November 1987 and later featured on the Pogues' 1988 album If I Should Fall from Grace with God. The song is an Irish folk-style ballad and was written as a duet, with the Pogues' singer MacGowan taking the role of the male character and MacColl the female character. 4 in 2019 on the British charts."Fairytale of New York" is a song written by Jem Finer and Shane MacGowan and recorded by their band the Pogues, featuring singer-songwriter Kirsty MacColl on vocals. 1 spot on the charts since its original release. Despite being one of the most celebrated holiday songs in the U.K., “Fairytale Of New York” has still never reached the No. “Fairytale Of New York” is the most played Christmas song during the holiday season in the U.K., and in December 2022 the song was certified quintuple platinum in the region. Since MacColl’s death, her part in “Fairytale Of New York” has been sung by everyone from Jem Finer’s daughter Ella, Sinéad O’Connor, Katie Melua, Cerys Matthews, and Victoria Clarke. Shortly after releasing her fifth album, Tropical Brainstorm, in 2000, MacColl was on vacation with her teenage sons and boyfriend in Cozumel, Mexico when she was struck and killed by a speeding power boat while she saving her son’s life. The Pogues finally made it to New York on tour in 1986. Sinatra was swinging and cars big as bars are imagined visions of more epoch days in New York, though MacGowan had never visited the city while writing the song but always dreamed of it. The beauty of it is that it sounds really simple.” NYC “It is by far the most complicated song that I have ever been involved in writing and performing. “Every night I used to have another bash at nailing the lyrics, but I knew they weren’t right,” said MacGowan. Finer focused on the more uptempo portions of the song, while MacGowan wrote around the slower verses and chorus. Written by MacGowan and founding Pogues member Jem Finer and set in its old Irish folk-punk arrangement with tin whistles, flutes, accordion, and a collection of instrumentation, “Fairytale Of New York” was originally started in 1985 and underwent a number of rewrites before it was ready two years later. I have been in hospitals on morphine drips, and I have been in drunk tanks on Christmas Eve.”Įlvis Costello first suggested MacGowan write a Christmas duet that he could sing with The Pogues’ then-bassist Cait O’Riordan-who later married Costello. I identified with the man because I was a hustler, and I identified with the woman because I was a heavy drinker and a singer. “And he’s just won on a horse at the unlikely odds of 18-1, so you’re not even sure he is telling the truth. “The guy is a bum who is living on the street,” said MacGowan in a 2020 interview. In the song, the man is an intoxicated gambler and the woman is a singer who also drinks too much, two characters MacGowan related to when writing the song. “Really, the story could apply to any couple who went anywhere and found themselves down on their luck,” said Clark of the meaning of the song. More broadly, “Fairytale of New York” tells the story of a couple who have fallen on hard times around the holidays, according to MacGowan’s partner and biographer, Victoria Mary Clark.
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