Rick Astley - 50

[Spooky]

Very impressed with his new album. I like the majority of the songs and they are all very uplifting.



https://www.amazon.com/50-Rick-Astley/dp/B01DDQP5S4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1475873173&sr=8-2&keywords=rick+astley+50

[Consigliere5]

He's included in this:
http://pigeonsandplanes.com/music/2016/10/seinfeld-theme-song

[Pearl@32]

Ooh, and it's streaming, too!

I caught one of those UK festivals on MTV Live this past summer and Rick rocked it, still awesome. I have loved Rick Astley's voice ever since he came on the scene with Whenever You Need Somebody. He became producers Stock/Aitken/Waterman's new export after Dead or Alive, Bananarama (the post-"Venus" success), and Kylie Minogue. Unfortunately RCA released all the producer-written songs for Rick and none of Rick's own songs, which were actually funkier. Granted, the hits like "Never Gonna Give You Up," "Together Forever," "It Would Take a Strong, Strong Man," and "Whenever You Need Somebody" were great and *extremely* catchy, they did not let him express his music. RCA let his first single on his next album be one that he wrote ("She Wants to Dance with Me"), but it'd be the last time he worked S/A/W. He scored with two hits on his next 2 albums and while he faded into the background, he never stopped recording — even a covers album which I bet is incredible — but then the Internet rickrolled and the rest was history. Glad he decided to embrace it!

[Pearl@32]

My girlfriend and I saw Rick Astley on Valentine's Day in D.C. at the 9:30 Club. He put on a wonderful show and played a lot of his hits as well as almost all of his new album, 50, which my friend brought to play in the car on our way to the show. Great album.

He and the band also managed to do 4 covers — 8, if you count where his backup vocalist segued into 3 snippets during "Cry for Help." They also did a mashup of "Take Me to Your Heart" (a song not released in the U.S.) and "We Found Love" by Calvin Harris w/ Rihanna.

He was so congenial and talked to the crowd a lot — "So who here got the first album?" I raised up my hands and screamed. "Thank you very much for giving my wife and I a very comfortable life. My mom also thanks you. She's living in a 3-bedroom house because of you." ... "You don't mind covers, right? I know how people can feel about covers, but sometimes you just get to an age where you don't give a gao se." Someone yelled, "Freebird!" And he replied back, "Freebird?!" His guitarist plunged into the lick of "Sweet Home Alabama" and while he stopped playing it, when they came back to do encores, Rick indulged the audience member by singing the song with help from a lyrics page on a phone. [You will find a link online to a review on The Washington Times website that says incorrectly, "CONCERT REVIEW: Rick Astley covers 'Freebird' at 9:30 Club in D.C."  ] They ended up doing a modern cover........Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars' "Uptown Funk"! He joked about being too tired to run around at 51 — "I don't dance anymore at my age."

He likes to do covers of artists from the cities they visit — Atlanta was the last one and they covered R.E.M.'s "The One I Love." This time he got his one of his crew to print out the lyrics to "Mercy Mercy Me / What's Going On" because Marvin Gaye was born in D.C. He joked about what to sing in Boston...."Aerosmith? Hmmm, might do The Cars instead!" He wore these black glasses to read lyrics.

He didn't get political except for one time, when he inferred about things being crazy or weird in D.C. He didn't elaborate and just got on with the party. I've never seen so many people taking selfies.....

Rick put on an excellent show — he's been sold out all over the U.S. and the U.K. — so worth the $35!

Thanks Eric for being understanding on <3 Day. 

[Spooky]

Very cool!

[Spooky]

hahahahahaha!

https://www.reddit.com/r/Music/comments/c8p363/im_rick_astley_and_you_can_ask_me_anything_again/esoels5/

[Spooky]

I have never seen so many Rick-Rolls in one Reddit thread.