Christmas Notes: “I wish it could be Christmas everyday”
From the book “Note di Natale” by Davide Pezzi (with a preface by Arturo Stàlteri) published by VoloLibero we are currently publishing some of the 95 songs covered by the author in the 300 pages of the volume; we tried to choose the least “predictable”.
1973. By a singular coincidence, in the upper reaches of the English singles charts a war takes place at the last sleigh bell between two of the most famous glam-rock bands of the moment: Slade and Wizzard, both struggling with a song rock dedicated to Christmas. The war for number one will be won by Slade with “Merry Xmaƨ Everybody”, which will not prevent “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday” from becoming a small classic of Christmas rock compilations.
The band’s leader, an eccentric character named Roy Wood, comes up with the idea of making a Christmas song while reflecting on the fact that there actually haven’t been any rock’n’roll Christmas songs since “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” by Brenda Lee. What Wood doesn’t imagine is that, practically at the same time, by a bizarre twist of fate, another one too
glam-rock band Slade are having the same idea.
Between May and June 1973 Roy Wood wrote the song, perhaps inspired by the title from a phrase by saxophonist Mike Burney, who had just joined the band. “I was doing really boring big band gigs on the dance hall circuit,” Burney said. “So when Roy offered me a job in the .
Wizzard was amazed, and I said to him, ‘Roy, being in this band, it’s like Christmas every day.'”
Wizzard enter the studio in London in August, and to make the environment a little more wintry and get into the spirit of
a Christmas song, sound engineer Steve Brown fills the studio with decorations, lights and even a large Christmas tree. Also, at Wood’s suggestion, large fans are brought in and the air conditioning is turned to maximum. «Boy, it was really cold at the end” – Wood recalls – “I asked the band to show up at the session wearing clothing suitable for the occasion, scarves and wool hats.» To make clear the care that the group puts into even a simple song destined, after all, to last throughout the holiday period, suffice it to say that to obtain
the initial effect of an old cash register, after countless unsatisfactory attempts with various instruments and sound effects discs, eventually a real vintage cash register is rented, and the singer pushes buttons while bassist Rick Price inserts coins.
Wood is very demanding, as drummer Keith Smart recalls: «The first day we recorded until 8 the next morning just to get the drum sounds he wanted.
When we went back to the studio the next day and listened, he didn’t like them anymore. Some little details weren’t right, so we threw out those tapes and did another twelve-hour session to fix things.” Even for the children’s choir the leader of the group does not compromise: even if they are recording in London, he wants it to be a choir from Birmingham, his hometown, even if it is more than two hundred kilometers from the capital. Bill Hunt, the keyboard player, suggests the kids from a school near his home, Stockland Green School, which paradoxically is located in Slade Road, exactly like Wizzard’s rivals for that year’s Christmas number one. Overcoming the resistance and legitimate concerns of their parents, the boys and girls of the school – all between ten and twelve.
years – one Saturday morning they are taken on a school bus to London, and after registration they are taken to the Hard Rock Café for burgers and ice creams. “We didn’t get any money, but when it was all over, he gave each of us a Wizzard album and all the badges and pins we could carry,” recalled Hilary Gunton, one of the choir girls. Roy Wood recalls: «When I was in the control room listening to the guys sing what I had written, I felt almost breathless and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. It was fantastic!
To promote the song, a very colorful and decidedly kitsch video was made (which is still part of the glam aesthetic), with the band dressed in colorful clothes and the singer with a white wig and a beard dyed white, in a decorated studio with lights, festoons and a snowman, then joined by a group of children playing toy instruments and joining in the singing.
Unfortunately for the band, the release of the single “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday” was preceded by a couple of weeks by the Slade song “Merry Xmaƨ Everybody”, which, as mentioned, reached the top of the charts on 25 December 1973 , while Wizzard’s single doesn’t reach higher than fourth position. In 1981 the band will release a new version, which will be reissued every Christmas, almost always entering the Top 30. In 2020, Roy Wood, commenting on the Christmas songs released in recent years, unexpectedly pointed to Mariah’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” Carey among her favorites, saying: “I think it’s a good pop song and in the spirit of what it should be.”
