radio. The month where the likes of Slade and Cliff Richard suddenly resurrect their careers. The month where everyone's battling to be the dreaded (and usually dreadful) Christmas Number One... So, what goes on at Christmas? What is it about the season of goodwill to all men that makes people lose all notions of taste and rush out and buy appalling records? It's a tricky question. First thing's first. We have to accept that most of the people who buy records at Christmas don't have any intention of listening to them. Nope, they buy them as presents. And if the evidence is anything to go by, they buy them as presents for people they don't like. Got a cousin that you can't stand? Get him a house remix of Bohemian Rhapsody . That'll sort him out.

Whatever the reasons, there certainly have been some very bad number ones over the years. The sixties weren't too bad, if you like the Beatles that is. The fab four managed to chalk up four yuletide chart toppers, including the relatively inoffensive Day Tripper and Hello Goodbye. However, these records were no indication of the horrors that were to come. By 1969, the dark days had set in. Rolf Harris topped the charts with Two Little Boys . As you might expect from `the decade that taste forgot', the seventies produced most of the worst offenders. They kicked off with Dave Edmunds' I Hear You Knockin' , and went promptly downhill from there. Benny Hill's brand of humour may now be seen as `classic comedy', but there's still no defence for `Ernie (The Fastest Milkman In The West) . He was followed by the equally terrible Little Jimmy Osmond, who spent most of the 1972 yuletide season telling us that he wanted to be our `Long Haired Lover From Liverpool' . No chance mate. The eighties didn't start much better. There's No-One Quite Like Grandma by the St.

Winifred's School Choir may not have hit the number one spot until a couple of days after Christmas, but it's still a prime contender for the title of worst yuletide single ever. Or at least it was until Mr. Blobby made his appearance in 1993. And here's where the `presents for people that you hate' theory falls down. Nobody, simply nobody, hates anybody quite that much. So what does this year have in store for us? Is it going to be another year where the best present you can get somebody is a set of earplugs? Well, maybe things are looking up. Oasis have already lit up the charts for most of the year, so perhaps the Gallagher brother can save us by notching up their first Christmas number one. Or what about their heroes, the Beatles? With a whole load of unreleased material hitting the shops, perhaps they can return to the spot they hogged in the sixties. Maybe. But a sinister force awaits in the wings.

It appears that Percy Sugden from Coronation Street has recorded a version of Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life. Come back Jimmy Osmond, all is forgiven.