Interest rate rises. Gas and electric bills going through the roof. It's enough to make anyone punch the air and shout "Christmas... My A*se!" - which is what Ricky Tomlinson is just about to do!

The Royle Family and Mike Bassett: Manager star is releasing a Christmas single on December 11th based on a variation of his well-known catch-phrase. Complete with sleigh bells and Ricky on banjo the aim of "Christmas My A*se!" is apparently "to poke fun at the usual singalong Christmas single" although, lets face it, it's also clearly an attempt by Ricky to get a bit of extra spending money for the January sales.

The single stems from an idea Tomlinson had during Christmas last year and he's gone on to team up with Patrick Aherne (Musical director of the Mrs Merton Show) and Maurice Cheetham (who, be warned, was last year involved in the Crazy Frog revolution!) to make it a reality. The final version of the single was mastered at Parr Street Studios in Liverpool, where a collection of local characters provided the singalong rabble rousing content as the song nears its end.

A clip from the single's low-budget video can be seen here: Real Player | Windows Media Player

p.s. Sorry about the photo!