Mark Tiddy
Website of Mark Tiddy | Musician, Christian, Youth Worker

As you may be aware from my previous post unsigned artist Alex Day has been making a bid for the Christmas number 1 slot. I’m not sure how seriously he took the idea to start with or how much of it was a bit jokey but all proceeds have been going towards World Vision and at the time of the midweek chart update amazingly he was at number 4.

This is amazing because he sits there above the likes of Coldplay and Rihanna and with acts such as Little Mix with the full force of the X-Factor in front of them only just in front.

Whether he gets number 1 or simply in the top ten surely this has to be a game changer!

Think about it. Alex Day has no major record label and has only really got where he is thanks to his own hard work via YouTube and the handwork of his fans which have been building up over a number of years.

Much like the 2009 campaign of getting Rage Against the Machine to Christmas number one people power and social media is having an impact.

The difference between the RATM campaign and Alex Day is that as a musician Alex Day has no major label, no real money behind his press yet is in the Top 10.

Surely this is good for the music industry? Surely this means that actually you no longer need a major label to do well but you need to put a lot of effort into your music and actually have talent?

I don’t think if this changes the entire game but it certainly means that with the internet and social media a major label isn’t the only way to do well in the charts.

Hopefully this campaign will encourage more musicians to get out there and do self promoting!

On Saturday Neil, my brother got married to Anna. It was a fantastic day and I had the privilege of being asked to make them a wedding video which, after 10 hours of editing is finally there.

I also got to test out the digital SLR I got a couple of months back shooting the HD video on it and taking some photos. I’m pretty happy with how some of the photos came out so here are a few of my favourites.

Tonight the awful X-Factor will announce the winner of their 2011 karaoke competition and it’s more than likely that this time next week some depressingly unimaginative cover of a song that’s not really old enough to be covered properly will be released however the Christmas number 1 slot of no longer a given to the X-Factor winner following the success of the incredibly exciting campaign in 2009 which saw Rage Against the Machine get the number 1 slot (and raise a lot of money for Shelter (not Simon Cowell) in the process).

Last year’s attempts were more copies but this year there seem to be 3 equally credible and deserving contestants to go alongside the X-Factor and so here’s a summary.

1 – Alex Day – Forever Yours

My favourite of the contestants is Alex Day (pictured above), I’ve been following his YouTube channel for a while and he posts amusing videos and is also a full-time independent musician…the bookmakers William Hill have given his catchy pop-song ‘Forever Yours’ 16/1 odds of getting the slot.

Forever Yours is a fun, catchy electro-pop song which will easily get stuck in your head…on top of that Alex Day is independent which means that actually his growing YouTube and music popularity is because he is a genuinely talented guy and not some karaoke singer auto-tuned to hell in a studio.

On top of that Alex all money raised for the song goes to providing water to people in Africa!

You can listen to the song here

 2 – Nirvana – Smells Like Teen Spirit

Following in the footsteps of ‘Rage Against the Machine’ a Facebook campaign is aiming to get Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ to number 1…with currently over 100,000 likes on Facebook and the promise of a vinyl re-issue of the single from the record label this campaign seems to be growing with momentum.

On top of that the campaign is raising money for charity ‘Rythmix’ who (as the story goes) protested to the X-Factor girl group stealing their name only to be told ‘you’d better find some lawyers then’…although since the name has been changed.

You can check out the campaign on Facebook here and Twitter here

3 – Military Wives – Wherever You Are

The Military Wives who have been coached by Gareth Malone are releasing their song ‘Wherever You Are’ also in contest for the number 1 slot raising money for the British Legion….the song isn’t to my taste but I think they’re equally deserving of the slot.

Conclusion and Buying Info

So…there you have it. 4 options for Christmas number 1 in the form of X-Factor, Alex Day, Nirvana and Military Wives and all but the X-Factor are raising money for charity so there’s clearly 3 out of 4 which are better but which will get it?

Personally as a fellow independent musician I’d love to see Alex Day get the top spot but only time will see!

You can buy the Christmas number 1 songs from the 18th December for them to count but only buy a song once or none of your purchases will count.

Get involved, raise some money for charity and let’s make music about music and not winning some competition!