Shane MacGowan, enigmatic yet troubled frontman of The Pogues, passed away in November 2023. Two years later, his sister says the grief is still close to the surface. With what would have been his 68th birthday coming up on December 25, Siobhan MacGowan shared her emotions.
Speaking with Sky News in December 2025, Siobhan reflected on The Pogues’ biggest hit, “Fairytale of New York.” This time of year, the song plays often, which Siobhan said she has trouble with.
“It’s still very raw for me,” she said. “I can’t listen to Shane’s music, and I can’t watch him on video or listen to him speak.”
Siobhan, Shane’s younger sister, worked with the band in their early years. She designed gig posters and flyers and later ran the fan club Ordnahone in the 80s. According to a 2010 forum page on the band’s website, Siobhan used to sell copies of the fanzine on her own website around that time.
Now, hearing anything by The Pogues is a reminder of her grief. “You can be a genius, the way you can avoid it,” she said, referring to “Fairytale of New York” and its public prevalence. “If it’s coming on, I just turn it straight off. If I’m in a supermarket, I just block it out, or I go into the loo, or I go outside, or I do something like that. But I have to block it.”
Shane MacGowan’s Younger Sister On Lasting Grief
Siobhan MacGowan continued, stating that she couldn’t listen to “Fairytale of New York” at all. During the holidays, and especially in Ireland, where she lives, the song is nearly inescapable. “It’s just pain,” she said. “Pain in my heart. It’s just so painful.”
While hearing her brother’s voice exacerbates her grief, Siobhan seemed interested in sharing memories of him. Specifically, she shared Christmas 1987, when “Fairytale of New York” was No. 1 in Ireland. However, in the U.K., the Pet Shop Boys had beaten it out with their cover of “Always On My Mind”. According to Siobhan, Shane hated that song.
“I remember him saying he wouldn’t have minded if it had been Michael Jackson that had beaten him,” she said. “But he couldn’t forgive the Pet Shop Boys. And it was a terrible cover of ‘Always On My Mind’! It was dreadful like, so he couldn’t forgive that.”
When asked whether Shane ever got over that slight from the Pet Shop Boys, Siobhan burst out laughing. She then replied with a simple, “No.”
The MacGowan siblings spent much of their time in Tipperary, Ireland. There, Siobhan and Victoria Mary Clarke, Shane’s widow, have organized a walking tour called Unravelling Shane. Fans have since pilgrimaged to the area to experience the landscape that shaped their favorite artist. Siobhan and Clarke are turning it into a more structured trail, recognizing the legacy woven throughout towns like Nenagh.
“It was [after Shane passed] I realized the huge volume of work and people’s reaction to him and his work that, to me, was extraordinary,” Siobhan recalled. “Like I thought, ‘Wow, look at what you did.’ That’s what I said, ‘Look at what you did, you know.’ It only seems to be getting stronger. His legacy only seems to be getting stronger.”
Photo by Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)
The post ‘It’s Still Very Raw’: Shane MacGowan’s Sister on Grieving the Pogues Frontman Two Years Later appeared first on VICE.
