BBC Radio One To Air Version Of Fairytale Of New York Without Homophobic Slur
This Christmas, BBC Radio 1 will not play the original version of Fairytale of New York by The Pogues and Kirsty MacColl but a censored version of the song, because its audience may be offended by some of the lyrics.
The station said young listeners were particularly sensitive to derogatory terms for gender and sexuality.
It will instead play an edited version with different lyrics sung by MacColl.
But the 1987 original will still be played on Radio 2, while 6 Music DJs can choose between the two versions, according to ‘BBC’.
A BBC spokesman said: “We know the song is considered a Christmas classic and we will continue to play it this year, with our radio stations choosing the version of the song most relevant for their audience.”
The duet is one of the most enduring Christmas pop songs, having returned to the UK top 20 every year since 2005. Along with a string of other festive favourites, it is now rising the chart again, at 59 in the current midweek chart.
But Radio 1 decided younger listeners who are unfamiliar with the track would find some of the words stark and not in line with what they would expect to hear on air.
The new edited version changes two lines - one swapped for an alternative version in which MacColl sings “You're cheap and you're haggard” in place of a homophobic slur.
MacColl sang the newly-added line on Top of the Pops in 1992.
The same wording was used by Ronan Keating and Moya Brennan in their 2000 cover version. When Ed Sheeran and Anne-Marie performed the song in Radio 1's Live Lounge in 2017, she opted to call him a “cheap lousy blagger”.
In Radio 1's newly-edited version, another line, sung by Shane MacGowan in the second verse, has a word removed entirely.
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