About Opentopia
Opentopia Directory Encyclopedia Tools

Rick Astley

Encyclopedia : R : RI : RIC : Rick Astley

Rick Astley on the cover of his album Whenever You Need Somebody in 1987.
Enlarge
Rick Astley on the cover of his album Whenever You Need Somebody in 1987.

Richard Paul Astley (born February 6, 1966) is an English singer, songwriter and musician. He was born in Newton-le-Willows, Lancashire, England.

Contents

Career

In 1985, Rick Astley was playing the club circuit as a singer with a soul band named FBI, when he was seen by the record producer Pete Waterman and persuaded to come to London to work at the PWL recording studio. Under the tutelage of production trio Stock Aitken Waterman Astley was taught about the recording process and groomed for his future career, supposedly starting off as the studio tea boy. During much of his career prior to the proliferation of music videos, many listeners assumed he was black.

His first single was the little-known "When You Gonna" credited to Rick & Lisa, but his first solo outing was "Never Gonna Give You Up," released in 1987. It became an immediate success, spending five weeks at the top of the British charts and becoming the year's highest-selling single. It was the first of no less than 13 (world-wide) top 30 hit singles for him.

The album Whenever You Need Somebody also reached Number One in the UK, and the hit singles continued, including the title track and a cover of Nat King Cole's "When I Fall In Love."

By January 1988, "Never Gonna Give You Up" had also topped the U.S. singles chart and was followed by a second U.S. #1 in April with his second U.S. single release "Together Forever."

By the end of the decade, Astley had parted company with Stock Aitken Waterman. He achieved one more major success with the 1991 ballad "Cry For Help," which reached the Top 10 in both the UK and the US. It featured a gospel choir arranged by Andraé Crouch, who'd also been involved with Madonna's 1989 hit "Like A Prayer."

For much of the 1990s and early 2000s, Astley remained largely out of the spotlight by his own choice, allegedly because he didn't like flying around the world or the media circus inherent with being a pop star, but also so that he could raise a family.

In 1991 the RIAA certified that two million copies of Whenever You Need Somebody had been sold. Total world sales of Astley's records (inclusive of singles, albums and compilation inclusions) have reached 40 million.

In early 2006, Astley withdrew unexpectedly at the eleventh hour from appearing on the BBC TV celebrity/pro duets show Just the Two of Us after committing to the series. This led to criticism from those in the entertainment industry and media. His place was filled by opera singer Russell Watson, who eventually won the competition.

According to Rick's Official website, he is currently writing and recording a brand new album. No release date is listed.

Trivia

Discography

Canada Top data: for singles and albums from The Record magazine. U.S. Top data: for singles from The Billboard Hot 100, for albums from The Billboard 200; UK Top data for singles and albums is from UK Singles Chart.

Albums

Singles

Compilations

See also

External link

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

Search Titles
0123456789
ABCDEFGHIJ
KLMNOPQRST
UVWXYZ?

E-mail this article to:

Personal Message: