dexys week: merry xmas everybody!

dexys were to the eighties what slade were to the seventies: eccentrically-attired top of the pops mainstays singing oddball pop masterpieces in thick regional accents. in both cases, their reputation as novelty acts, but their albums revealed much greater depth. both bands made minor inroads into the US, but remained essentially, parochially, defiantly, british. here's the sort of thing that doesn't happen any more: dexys covering slade's inescapable 'merry xmas everybody', beamed into millions of living rooms on christmas day, 1982.