Foo Fighters Surprise Fans with Rick Astley in a Live Rendition of “Never Gonna Give You Up”

Foo Fighters have always emphasized having fun, and their London O2 performance was no different, as the band Rickrolled their audience with an unexpected appearance by Rick Astley, who performed his iconic song “Never Gonna Give You Up”. The group combined Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” with the chords of Astley’s hit, while the ’80s star infused a bit of rock ‘n’ roll into his typically smooth vocals,

The entire collaboration was surprisingly effective, and fans in the stadium went wild, clearly enjoying themselves as the band had the time of their lives. As anticipated for the originally meme-famous song, online fans also adored it, with the video amassing 9.1 million views, as shown below.

At the time of the performance, Astley was 52 and had already retired from music once, but the English pop star’s voice remained impeccable. Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl was beaming throughout the performance, clearly enjoying the surprise rock and pop fusion for his fans.

Interestingly, Foo Fighters and Rick Astley share quite a history. Grohl has performed with him multiple times, notably when the Foos and Astley spontaneously played “Never Gonna Give You Up” live in Tokyo. Astley has also reciprocated by covering one of the Foo Fighters’ songs, this time in the studio. You can watch Astley’s cover of the Foos’ hit “Everlong” in the video below, which also became popular online, garnering 5.3 million views.

Astley played acoustic guitar while performing “Everlong”, staying surprisingly true to the original recording. However, he adds more vocal power and dynamics to the song, creating a truly beautiful cover.

In an interview with Virgin Radio UK, Astley revealed that his first performance with the band in Japan was entirely spontaneous and unrehearsed. He explained that he was on the same lineup as the Foo Fighters at a festival in Japan. He added that he stood right beside the stage during their set, as Foos members Grohl and Taylor Hawkins are two of his favorite musicians, because “somewhere in my DNA I’m a drummer”, referring to his beginnings in music as a percussionist.

Astley said that a Foo Fighters roadie approached him, handed him a mic, and said “Dave wants you onstage.” The pop star added that he was jet-lagged and had a couple of beers by that time, but he wasn’t going to miss the opportunity. Astley then shared another interesting detail, saying “somehow they’d learned “Never Gonna Give You Up” and they’d jammed it”, with the intention of potentially having Astley sing it at the festival.

Astley concluded the story by saying “so I ended up singing to 50,000 people with the Foo Fighters on a weird and wonderful version of “Never Gonna Give You Up”. It was proper nuts.” He then issued a language warning for anyone planning to watch it on YouTube, stating “there’s quite a bit of swearing at the beginning of it, because I just lost myself in that moment.”