Queen – Thank God It’s Christmas

“Thank God It’s Christmas” is a Christmas single by the British rock band Queen.

“Thank God It’s Christmas” was mainly written by Queen drummer Roger Taylor. However, when he found himself struggling to come up with a chorus he asked the band’s lead guitarist, Brian May, to help him out.

When the pair finished the tune they presented it to Freddie Mercury. It was the vocalist’s ability to pull back for that song which Brian May remembers. He told Ultimate Classic Rock: “(Freddie) loved it and did a beautiful vocal. I think it’s just the most understated vocal, and I love it, you know.”

The song was released on November 27, 1984 and spent six weeks in the UK charts over Christmas 1984 and the New Year of 1985, peaking at #21. Queen were big in the mid-1980s in their home country, so the song’s relative lack of success is surprising. May believes this is because they didn’t film a promotional video for their festive tune. He said: “The funny thing is, it doesn’t get that much attention in Britain as a Christmas single, because it doesn’t have a video. Everything’s about video these days and we never made a video for that song. It’s all in your mind. But I’m very fond of it. I think it’s a very different kind of Christmas song.”

The song was not originally released on any Queen studio album, appearing only on Queen’s Greatest Hits III, released in 1999, and as the B-side of the single “A Winter’s Tale” from the 1995 album Made in Heaven. However, the track was finally included on the bonus EP packaged with the deluxe edition of their album The Works, remastered and re-released in 2011.

It appears on the Christmas compilation LP The Edge of Christmas in its full 12″ version with the drum intro. It also appears on the US-only compilation boxed-set The Queen Collection, which consisted of a re-release of the LPs Classic Queen and Queen’s Greatest Hits along with a bonus CD called Queen Talks that included this song, along with a 1989 interview with the band.

Lyrics
Oh my love
We’ve had our share of tears
Oh my friends
We’ve had our hopes and fears
Oh my friends
It’s been a long hard year
But now it’s Christmas
Yes, it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
The moon and stars seem awful cold and bright
Let’s hope
The snow will make this Christmas right
My friend the world
Will share this special night
Because it’s Christmas
Yes it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
For
One
Night
Thank God it’s Christmas, yeah
Thank God it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
Can it be Christmas?
Let it be Christmas
Every day
Oh my love
We live in troubled days
Oh my friend
We have the strangest ways
All my friends
On this one day of days
Thank God it’s Christmas
Yes it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
For
One
Day
Thank God it’s Christmas
Yes it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
Ooh yeah
Thank God it’s Christmas
Yes yes yes yes it’s Christmas
Thank God it’s Christmas
For
One
Day
Christmas, a very merry Christmas to you all

Songwriters: Roger Taylor / Brian May
Thank God It’s Christmas lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC

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