Actually it wasn’t, because I only had the idea for a musical advent calendar on December 10th. But here we all are ten years and eleven musical advent calendars later, having enjoyed the highlights (Christmas songs from around the world, twenty-four versions of White Christmas, Christmas songs by Phenomenal Women) and, let’s be frank, lowlights (Christmas number ones from my lifetime, everything By Ringo Starr) together. So it’s only fitting, this year, to celebrate hitting double figures by enjoying twenty-four Christmas hits written (or in a couple of cases released) since December 2008: songs which I didn’t include first time round not because they weren’t any good, but because they didn’t exist yet. I made this list a month ago and I’ve been listening to it on rotation ever since so I can tell you with complete confidence that there are some crackers here.

In the meantime, to get you in the mood, here’s Cliff, whose last hit was in September 2008, meaning [spoilers] he WILL NOT FEATURE in this year’s line-up (except for now).

Happy Advent!