Hallelujah - It's nearly Christmas

(By Richard Holway) With all the bad news around at the moment, it is important for us at UKHotviews to inject some lighthearted balance.

I’ve been amazed at the fervour surrounding the X-factor. As we were out on Saturday my daughter demanded that we record it and didn’t want to know the result until we all watched the final together on Sunday night. And the winner was? Hallelujah!

It is, of course, a wondrous song. But there really is only one version – that by Jeff Buckley not Alexandra Burke. Buckley recorded it on his Grace album in 1993 but drowned in 1997 - a fate so fitting to those who listen to too much Leonard Cohen.

Although I already have the song, I took notice of the worldwide internet campaign to get the Buckley version to be the Christmas Number One and downloaded it again from iTunes. (If only 79p was the cost of my only silliness this year…) I understand the two versions of Hallelujah are #1 and #2 in the download charts right now.

Leonard Cohen must (for once) have a very big smile on his face!