Hozier Covers The Pogues' 'Fairytale Of New York' For 'Saturday Night Live' Return

Hozier has gotten into the Christmas spirit, pulling out a cover of a classic track from The Pogues for his long-awaited return to Saturday Night Live over the weekend.

The Irish musician appeared on the long-running US television show on Saturday night, performing as the musical guest for the annual Christmas show as part of its 50th season. The episode was a notable one already, thanks in part to host Martin Short, who celebrated his induction into the Five-Timers Club, having served as host on five separate occasions.

It was a homecoming of sorts for Hozier, too, who had made his US television debut on the program back in 2014, performing his tracks Take Me To Church and Angel Of Small Death at the time. Now, ten years later, his latest appearance was designed as one to remember.

Performing the customary two tracks allocated to musical guests, Hozier launched into his chart-topping hit Too Sweet, before closing out the evening with a cover of The Pogues’ perennial favourite Fairytale Of New York.

Hozier in a fitting tribute to Shane MacGowan and the Pogues beautifully performed Fairytale of New York live on SNL pic.twitter.com/lxFksTDSi6

— Chris Holly (@ChrisHollyMusic) December 22, 2024

Notably, it’s rather rare for musical guests to perform cover songs as part of their appearance on Saturday Night Live, and the choice of song may have been somewhat controversial due to its lyrical content which has been called into question over the years.

The Pogues’ frontman Shane MacGowan (who passed away in November 2023 at the age of 65) had previously addressed calls for the track to be censored due to the handful of slurs that that appear during its fifth verse as part of a sung conversation between MacGowan and the late Kirsty MacColl.

“The word was used by the character because it fitted with the way she would speak and with her character,” MacGowan explained to The Irish Times in 2018. “She is not supposed to be a nice person, or even a wholesome person. She is a woman of a certain generation at a certain time in history and she is down on her luck and desperate.”

“If people don’t understand that I was trying to accurately portray the character as authentically as possible then I am absolutely fine with them bleeping the word but I don’t want to get into an argument,” he concluded.

Regardless of the original lyrical content and its intent, Hozier’s cover of the track was performed without any of the controversial language, altering the lyrics in line with a television-friendly performance by MacColl on Top Of The Pops in 1992.

With the musician kicking things off in solo fashion, Hozier found himself joined by strings and a trio of backing vocalists alternating their take on MacColl’s lyrics. Wrapping up with fake snow falling from the sky, the performance is likely going to go down as one of the finer Christmas performances you’ll see this year.