Noddy Holder | Merry Xmas Everybody is about to hit the airwaves, but how much does he make from the song?

With Christmas looking around the corner, and shops already starting to stock festival items despite, as David George rightly commented, it’s not even November yet, of course, that also means that retain chains across the country will start pumping out the usual Christmas hits; Wizzard’s ‘I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday’ or East 17’s ballad ‘Stay Another Day.’

We also can’t forget the utter earworm that is Slade’s ‘Merry Xmas Everybody,’ with lead singer Noddy Holder bellowing out the immortal line ‘It’s Christmas’ in his unmistakeable Black Country tones. But rather than perhaps shudder over the idea that the song is going to be omnipresent throughout the next month or two, perhaps we should be celebrating Noddy Holder’s Christmas classic?

It was revealed earlier this week that Holder had cancer of the oesophagus and the initial diagnosis was that he would only have six months to live. That was five years ago however and despite no longer picking up the microphone with Slade, he can still bask in the glow of knowing ‘that’ Christmas song is still doing the rounds - with the single turning 50 this year.

It’s also a fair chunk of money that he earns through royalties and licensing deals he nets annually; in an article by The Independent in 2022, they ‘guestimated’ how much money artists earn from their Christmas singles, and unsurprisingly, Slade tops the list. ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’ is estimated to earn Slade £500,000 per year in royalties and licensing revenue and if adjusted to reflect inflation over the last two years since The Independent’s original guestimations, that would mean that this year Noddy Holder and Slade might be netting £1.1 million in revenue from that song.

Those curious as to that ‘other’ Christmas song that seems to be everywhere during the festive season, Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas (Is You)’ is estimated to earn around £376,000, with Bing Crosby’s ‘White Christmas’ earning £328,000 and ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham! earning an estimated £300,000.