Posted on 01/09/2026 3:14:15 PM PST by nickcarraway
Rick Astley will always be grateful for his smash hit single Never Gonna Give You Up — and he has come to terms with the fact it'll be the track he'll always be remembered for.
The 59-year-old singer topped the charts all over the world with the 1987 song, which was written and produced by legendary pop trio Stock Aitken Waterman and included on his 15 million copies selling debut LP Whenever You Need Somebody.
Almost 40 years later, Never Gonna Give You Up remains a constant on the radio and online thanks to the Rickrolling internet meme, but Rick is fine with it and thankful to have had a hit that has endured for so long.
In an interview with the new issue of Classic Pop magazine, he said: "I mean, God bless that song. From the first time that Mike Stock sang it to me, I knew it was a banger. I've always felt that song's got stardust on it. I've always felt that song's got fairydust on it. I've never been embarrassed by it. But it was also strange, that record being so big [straight] off the bat. I never had the opportunity to go, 'What's going on?' I went from never having been on TV to being on TV every day, travelling all over the world."
Although he has accepted that Never Gonna Give You Up is the song that will define his career, Rick does wish that some of his other hits got a little bit of love.
He added: "I'm painfully aware that this song, that I did decades ago, is the thing that people are always going to remember me for, and I came to terms with that years ago. I just wish they'd always remember me for four or five other songs. Together Forever was also number one in the United States, but people never bring that one up."
The Rickrolling phenomenon began in 2007 and peaked in 2008 with the surprise appearance of Rick's music video pushing Never Gonna Give You Up to over a billion views on YouTube.
Rick was happy to embrace the Rickrolling phenomenon as he could see it was already huge and not going away.
He said: "It was happening anyway, you couldn't stop it. So I thought, 'Whatever, I'll run with this.'"
A few years later, Rick released his first album, titled 50, for over 10 years.
The LP — which was released to mark his 50th birthday, hence the title — topped the Official UK Albums Chart and was the start of Rick's career resurgence, something that felt like a "fairy tale" to him.
Rick — who wrote every song and played every instrument on the record — said: "I didn't make it for a record label, or even to be heard, really. I was making it for me. So the fact it was so successful... it was kind of like a fairy tale."
BTW, around 1975 was in Hollywood with my band. Our mgr got us tickets to a “press party” for a new group, “Ace,” just out with a hit single, “How Long (has this been goin’ on)”. Long story short, I saw first hand why they were a one-hit wonder. They were terrible.
Yeah, but Paul Carrack has had a lot of hits with other bands.
Alone Again was played a lot in the 70's and 80's, but then it stopped being played as much, for some reason.
I guess, to have one hit, All You Need is a Miracle. But you might be Tempted to try for another.
As long as he did it in The Living Years.
BTW, that’s a great bit of history, and the recording isn’t *that* bad. Or maybe it’s decades of too much loud rock music and old ears, I dunno . . .
Anyway, I can’t compete with that, but I do have some Skynyrd stories from my (somewhat misspent) youth.
So in the 90s, I had season tickets at Chastain Amphitheater in N. Atlanta. We had really good seats, maybe 50’ from stage center, and 4 rows up from the floor tables/seats.
C. 1994, Neil Young. And as people would do back then, there’s that drunk/stoned guy who between songs is yelling “FREEBIRD! FREEBIRD!” from the audience.
After a few songs of this, Neal tears into a few bars of Freebird, then starts haranguing the guy back for a bit. Until he says something like “Dude, why do you do that, those guys are dead!?”
There comes a yell from about 50’ to my right, from the floor seats/tables:
“NO WE’RE NOT!”
Rossington and Collins were in the audience!
So that leads to 5 minutes or more of Neil and them talking back and forth!
LOLOL!
Eventually Neil got back into his set list, but it was damn sure an interesting moment.
Have 2-3 other LS stories for another time.
I saw Don McLean at the 30A Songwriters Festival, right before Covid hit, January 2020. He was still quite good. He talked from the stage about selling the original manuscript for American Pie, which I think went for 7 figures.
Roads to Moscow is another great Al Stewart song. If you’re not very familiar with it, take the time to do a close listen. He supposedly did a ton a historic research to write songs like that and On The Border.
Wow!
It’s stuck in my head right now....ugh
Hope it’s gone before i hit the bed..
“Claire” was another one..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjkP3Gwt_g4
Hilarious. Thanks for sharing. 👍
Funny though, Johnny was the one who took umbrage with Rick, who had to call him and say that they had no plans to tour it (they did have plans), while Moz endorsed it 'anything you can get out of the warhorse, it almost merits the effort'.
And then that show led to the reunion offer, and Johnny shot it down flat.
They could have done a baker's dozen for 250M without looking at each other, Oasis did it, hell the Journey farewell will make a little less for 5x the dates and Cain v Schon, I hope they save the Thunderdome for the last show. My money's on Cain.
Hehehe. Ah the 80s. Such great music and bazaar music. Souxie and the Banshees. The Cure. All the punk bands. AND still great rock with AC/DC and Aerosmith getting their footing after a rocky start in the 70s (no pun intended.. RIP Bonn Scott) then the explosion of thrash rock with Metallica and Megadeath hit the scene and WOW. I love that hard hitting metal. I’m on the late end of 60 and love blasting that music. Now.... maybe I’m an old fuddy duddy. The music today is so sterile or just ghetto trash filth. There are a few new bands here and there I enjoy but geesh. They are all so in your face political, with “the current thing” they are unlistenable and I’m not going to support them. I never heard Rob Zombie complain about my politics.
Didn’t morrisey even demand his fans didn’t wear leather or some such silliness to “save the animals?”
Hehehe. My buddy’s grand dad was in Gunsmoke way back in the day and still gets a check. Enjoy that cash. Party time.
He’s had at least two hits - Together Forever was also big.
A few of his new songs are actually pretty good. Check out Angels on My Side. The video is fun too.
Carrak was fine, but the band sucked. Just no songs.
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