I'm Gonna Be

"I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)"
Single by The Proclaimers
from the album Sunshine on Leith
Released	August 1988 (United Kingdom) 1993 (United States) March 2007 (UK re-release)
Format	7", cassette single, CD single
Recorded	1988 (Original version) 2007 (Re-recorded version)
Genre	Rock, folk rock
Length	3:37 (Original album version) 3:42 (2007 version)
Label	Chrysalis
Producer	Pete Wingfield
The Proclaimers singles chronology
"Make My Heart Fly" (1987) "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" (1988) "Sunshine on Leith" (1990)
Peter Kay chronology "Is This the Way to Amarillo" Tony Christie ft. Peter Kay (2005) "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" feat. Andy Pipkin and Brian Potter (2007) "The Winner's Song" (2008)

"I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" is a song written and performed by Scottish pop band The Proclaimers. It was released on their 1988 Sunshine on Leith album, and subsequently as a single. It has become one of their most popular songs, reaching #11 in the UK charts and No. 1 on the Australian ARIA Charts in 1989, plus, five years later, #3 in the US Billboard Hot 100. The song has become a live staple at their concerts. The Proclaimers played it at Edinburgh 50,000 - The Final Push, the final concert of Live 8 at Murrayfield Stadium on 6 July 2005, to symbolise the conclusion of The Long Walk To Justice.

The song is popular in Scotland, where at Hampden Park, every time the national football team scores, the song is played and sung along to by Scotland fans. It was featured on the soundtrack to the 1993 film Benny & Joon. As a result the original music video was re-edited with clips from the film.

The song was also the theme song for the Swedish TV-show, High Chaparall. It was also featured repeatedly in the How I Met Your Mother episode "Arrivederci, Fiero" as a "cassingle" of the song becomes stuck in the tape deck of Marshall Eriksen's Pontiac Fiero, and remains there for the duration of 1994 to 2007. It was featured once again in How I Met Your Mother in the Season 5 episode Duel Citizenship as the roadtrip music for Ted and Marshall.

Track listing

Original 1988 version

1. "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)"
2. "Better Days"
3. "Teardrops"

Comic Relief 2007 version

1. "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" (New audio with special guests)
2. "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" (Original 1988 version)
3. "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)" (CD-ROM video [new version with special guests])
4. Photo gallery

Covers

• Scotsman George Donaldson of Celtic Thunder, on their 2009 album "Take Me Home"
• Highland Heartbeat
• Alexander Rybak, on his 2009 album "Fairytales"
• Me First and the Gimme Gimmies- a punk cover band who does 'punk' versions of various songs
• MXPX, on their 2009 album On The Cover II.
• Down By Law, on their album Punkrockacademyfightsong.
• Spunge on their covers album That Should Cover It!.
• Koopa, as a B-side on their single "No Trend".
• Toy Dolls, on their album One More Megabyte.
• The Belgian band Voice Male, on their albums That's Live and On Stage.
• Steven Curtis Chapman, on his album All About Love.
• Phish, on 12/30/97 at Madison Square Garden with Tom Marshall.
• The MacDonald Brothers, on The X Factor.
• Maxïmo Park, live on Jo Whiley's Live Lounge for BBC Radio 1.
• Mimikry, on their album Automatiskt (Swedish, title: 500 mil)
• Verbal Warning currently perform a punked-up version of this in their live set.
• Najwa Nimri, on her album Walkabout
• Mixtape Metro, released only on Myspace, but later became popular on the radio.
• Irish group The Whole Shabang covered the song at the Irish Festival in Wildwood, NJ in 2007
• "T In The Park Allstars" - a "supergroup" assembled by Radio 1 DJ Annie Mac during the 2008 T in the Park Festival in Scotland. Many performers from the weekend were requested to sing a single line from the song, then the result was edited together and played at the end of her Sunday afternoon show.
• Sussebassene at their Christmas concert 2008
• The Flying Pickets.

Comic Relief

The Proclaimers re-recorded the song, with Peter Kay and Matt Lucas, the latter two in the guise of their characters Brian Potter and Andy Pipkin (from Phoenix Nights and Little Britain respectively). There is a slight change in the lyrics with the words "roll 500 miles" replacing "walk 500 miles". This is because the characters Brian Potter and Andy Pipkin are both in wheelchairs. There is also the line "Bobby Davro" included in time with the music, because Brian Potter spots Bobby in the audience. This version was released as a charity single for Comic Relief on 19 March 2007.^[1] It reached #3 on the official UK Singles Chart on download sales alone, and one week later reached number one, where it remained for three weeks. It sold 126,000 copies in its first week making it the biggest selling number one of the year up to that point. Its sales were double that of the "official" Comic Relief single by Girls Aloud vs. Sugababes, and their cover of Aerosmith's Walk This Way. The song ended 2007 as the year's 9th biggest-selling single in the UK^[2]

The Proclaimers' original recording also re-entered the Top 40 following the success of the Comic Relief version.

References