The Top Christmas Song of 2024
The Christmas season is here, and there’s one song that towers over all the others when it comes to popularity this time of year. – Author: Charles Ken, Album artwork via Sony Music Entertainment’s Legacy Recordings
The Christmas season is here, and there’s one song that towers over all the others when it comes to popularity this time of year. It’s almost a joke at this point that this song is the No. 1 Christmas song of the modern era, because each year, like clockwork, it saturates the airwaves and playlists for pretty much anyone in the Christmas spirit.
Top Christmas Song of 2024
The top Christmas song on iTunes, according to PopVortex, is Mariah Carey with “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” In addition to Carey’s song being the No. 1 hit song in the U.S. on Christmas Day, it’s spent 17 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 100 chart, according to Billboard, and is the current No. 1 song in the country on that chart. So, yes, it’s a popular song during the holiday season. Carey released the new classic on October 28, 1994.
The Billboard 100 chart, which is a tally of the most popular songs in the U.S., is packed with holiday songs this Christmas week. No. 2 on the tally is Brenda Lee with “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree,” followed by Wham! with “Last Christmas” at No. 3, Bobby Helms with “Jingle Bell Rock” at No. 4 and Burl Ives with “A Holly Jolly Christmas” at No. 5. It’s interesting to note that most of the songs on the Billboard 100 on Christmas week are Christmas classics that were released decades ago.
For the PopVortex chart, they include “genres including pop, rock, R&B, country and children’s Christmas songs.” The Billboard 100 chart also includes songs from all genres.
“All I Want for Christmas Is You” is breaking streaming records, too. Per Billboard, the song “sets a new mark for the most time spent at No. 1 on Billboard’s Streaming Songs chart since its 2013 inception, spending a record 21st week atop the Dec. 28-dated tally.”
Also, “All I Want for Christmas Is You” has 48 million official U.S. streams earned in the week ending Dec. 19, which is up 13%, according to Luminate.
A ‘Modern Classic’ for a Holiday Song
Speaking with the Los Angeles Times in October, Carey talked about the timeless nature of “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”
When asked about the second-best song on her “Merry Christmas,” Carey said, “There’s a song called ‘Miss You Most (At Christmas Time).’ It’s a tough one. Someone once told me — actually, it was my late mother — that it was the saddest Christmas song ever.”
She added that having a sad Christmas song is okay, stating, “Think about ‘Blue Christmas.’ Some people are always in a funk around the holidays — not everybody’s all festive, running around in the snow like other people we know [laughs]. You know what song is pretty sad to me? ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over).'”
Also, with “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” Carey talks about how she wanted a timeless song, stating, “With the production, yes. I guess I was thinking when I was writing it to have it be timeless, too. I wanted it to feel like a modern classic.”
It certainly is a modern classic that will likely be a holiday favorite for generations to come.
- The Top Christmas Song of 2024 - December 25, 2024
- Classic Rockers Teaming Up for Benefit Show - December 12, 2024
- Beatles Drummer Ringo Starr Announces 2025 Tour Dates - December 9, 2024
