Chris Rea, British Blues Rocker Known For ‘Driving Home For Christmas,’ Dies at 74

Chris Rea, the British blues rocker best known for his 1978 soft rock hit “Fool (If You Think It’s Over)” and the wistful, jazzy holiday hit “Driving Home for Christmas,” has died at 74. The news was announced by the singer/guitarist’s family on his official Instagram page on Monday morning (Dec. 22), where they wrote, “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Chris, who died peacefully earlier today following a short illness. Chris’s music has created the soundtrack to many lives, and his legacy will live on through the songs he leaves behind.”

At press time no additional information was available about when Rea died or the manner of death.

Rea released two dozen albums over his 50-year career, including two that reached No. 1 on the U.K. albums charts — 1989’s The Road to Hell and 1991’s Auberge — and landed one song in the U.S. top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart, “Fool (If You Think It’s Over),” which topped out at No. 12 in the summer of 1978.

One of the singer’s other most beloved tracks is a seasonally appropriate one, the melancholy 1986 ballad “Driving Home For Christmas,” about a wintry trip home for the holidays penned while he was actually driving back from Abbey Road Studios in London through snowy traffic while longing to be in the cozy confines of home.

“Driving home for Christmas/ With a thousand memories/ I take look at the driver next to me/ He’s just the same,” Rea sings in his gravelly voice over gentle piano, brushed drums and jazzy guitar.

Born Chris Anton Rea in Middlesbrough, England on March 4, 1951, Rea eschewed a career in his family’s ice cream factory and bought his first guitar when he was in his early 20s, focusing his self-taught bottleneck slide style on his love for early blues players and his singing on inspiration from gospel singers.

After a stint in the local band Magdalene in which he was briefly bumped-up to lead singer, Rea set out on his own and formed the group the Beautiful Losers, before going out on his own and releasing his debut single, “So Much Love,” in 1974. He hit pay dirt a few years later in the all-important U.S. market when “Fool (If You Think It’s Over)” charted in America and earned Rea his first, and only, Grammy nomination in 1979 for best new artist, which he lost to disco act A Taste of Honey (“Boogie Oogie Oogie”) in a tight competition that also included Elvis Costello, The Cars and Toto.

The song was included on Rea’s 1978 debut album, Whatever Happened to Benny Santini?, which topped out at No. 49 on the Billboard 200 album chart, with the title track hitting No. 71 on the Hot 100. He followed up with Deltics in 1979 and Tennis in 1980, neither of which made much of a dent on the U.K. or U.S. charts.

He finally broke through on 1987’s Dancing With Strangers, which spawned his first top 20 U.K. single, the jumpy blues pop number “Let’s Dance,” which reached No. 12 in England and No. 81 on the Hot 100. He was back on the U.S. charts the next year with what would be his final U.S.-charting song, the chugging ZZ Top-like rocker “Working On It,” which ran up to No. 73 on the Hot 100 in early 1989.

His seasonal classic, originally recorded in 1986, was featured on his 1988 compilation, New Light Through Old Windows, and in the years since it has become an annual favorite, often ending the year as one of the top 10 Christmas singles on the U.K. charts. While he never toured the U.S., Rea was a solid draw in his native country, as well as in Australia and Japan and he earned his first No. 1 album in the U.K. in 1989 with his best-selling album, The Road to Hell.

As proof of his rising popularity, Rea performed guitar on the 1989 Band Aid II charity single re-recording “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” alongside Bananarama, Kylie Minogue, Cliff Richard, Lisa Stansfield and Wet Wet Wet, among others. He scored another U.K. No. 1 with his next album, 1991’s Auberge, and continued to release new LPs throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, taking a break in 2001, when he had his pancreas removed along with parts of his stomach and small intestine, followed by a stroke in 2016.

Rea released his 24th album, Road Songs For Lovers, in 2017 and embarked on a tour that was cut short when he collapsed on stage during a U.K. show, which resulted in the cancellation of the final shows on the outing. His 25th and final album, 2019’s limited-edition One Fine Day, revived songs he’d recorded nearly 30 years earlier but which had never been released together before.

The guitarist/singer was also a racing enthusiast, who participated in the 1993 British Touring Car Championship, collected and restored classic racing cars and recorded the sweeping, emotional ballad “Saudade” in a tribute to three-time Formula One racing champ Ayrton Senna for the BBC’s 1995 documentary about the beloved Brazilian driver’s life and tragic death on the course at the San Marino Grand Prix.

Check out some of Rea’s hits below.