We suspect that the UK’s interest in what song is number one in the charts at Christmas isn’t mirrored in most other countries. But it is a big deal there, and Amazon Music appears to be going all-out to secure the top spot this year with Kylie Minogue.

We wrote about her ‘XMAS’ Amazon Music Original track entering the top 10 earlier this month, but 48 hours in to the race for Christmas number one, it’s the early leader according to The Official Charts Company. ‘XMAS’ was 7,000 units ahead of Wham’s ‘Last Christmas’ in the first-look chart.

Impressive, given that Kylie’s song is exclusive to Amazon Music, but there are three key factors. First, the power of Amazon’s recommendations whenever anybody asks Alexa for ‘Christmas music’.

Second, the fact that ‘XMAS’ is a brand new track, so under UK chart rules it has a ‘streaming ratio’ advantage over older Christmas hits – see the ‘Accelerated Decline’ section of the rules here for how that works.

And third – which is where Amazon’s strategy comes into play – on the first day of Christmas chart week, it dropped new physical editions of ‘XMAS’ on vinyl and CD. An interesting moment, if physical editions drive a single-DSP streaming exclusive to the festive top spot…