Music: Never Gonna Give You Up

Rick Astley was at his creative apex when he released his signature hit, "Never Gonna Give You Up." Charting at #1 all over the world, even in the important countries like America, the song was an unqualified commercial and critical success:



"Never Gonna Give You Up" mixes Astley's unmistakeable baritone (seriously, he sounds like a black guy - cf. "Caribbean Queen") and the best of '80s dance-pop. You just can't help but dance to the tune; the people in the song's music video are not actors, but denizens of West London who got so frenzied by the tune that they engaged in spontaneous acrobatics (the video's director, Simon West, had "never seen anything like it").

Unfortunately, Astley's career went into a death spiral after "Never Gonna Give You Up." Nowadays, he throws out material just to pay his electricity bill, like this awful song called "Lights Out":



What the heck, Rick? Where are the dancing girls? The chain link fences? No bartender, either? Oh, how the mighty have fallen...