The Day Rick Astley Ruled The World…
Once upon a time there lived a man by the name of Rick Astley. In the 1980s, this man, with his perfect bouffant hair, and loose fitting suit, was the epitome of pop for a brief period, when Never Gonna Give You Up, his one and only big hit, took the world by storm.
And then he disappeared, another victim of the one hit wonder obscurity which has hit so many artists before him, and after.
Fast forward 20 years, and a cult Internet phenomenon begins, that of RickRolling, which sees people blindly clicking on links on websites, and in forums, only to be taken to a video of Rick doing his strangely hypnotic dance.
The meme began on a small level, but gradually started to overtake forums, blog comments, and Twitter. And then April 1st 2008 arrives, and the phenomenon goes mainstream.
As an April Fools Day joke, YouTube, the biggest video sharing site in the world, decided to RickRoll its millions of daily users by sending anyone who clicks on a ‘Featured Video’ to Rick performing Never Gonna Give You Up.
01/04/08 will surely go down as the day that Rick Astley, long forgotten British pop star, once again ruled the world with his floppy hair and cheesy dance routine.
[Photo Source: kbcool at Flickr]
Tags: Brit, British, Never Gonna Give You Up, Pop, Rick Astley, Rickroll, Rickrolled, Rickrolling, Twitter, UK, YouTube
1 opinion for The Day Rick Astley Ruled The World…
Mark Fishwick
May 3, 2008 at 10:47 am
One Hit Wonder? Where do you get ur info from? Rick Astley was the first British male solo artist to have his first 8 singles go top ten in the UK! Also, he has hit the prestigious Us No1. TWICE!!! No easy feat… He has also sold more records than Robbie Williams, Oasis, Take That worldwide! All this recent phenomenen has succeeded in doing is raising his profile once again! SONY have capitalised on this by releasing a new “Greatest Hits” package!
Astley deserves more credit instead of being ridiculed all the time!
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