I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)

"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	Celtic rock, college rock
Length	3:33 (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 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 No. 11 in the UK charts and No. 1 on the Australian ARIA Charts in 1989, plus, five years later, No. 3 in the United States 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".

Popular culture

In October 2010, the song was played during the Glasgow 2014 handover section of the closing ceremony of the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

It was featured on the soundtrack to the 1993 film Benny & Joon, when Mary Stuart Masterson kept playing Sunshine on Leith while the filming of the movie progressors. Filmmakers took special notice of this song in particular and as a result, the original music video for I'm Gonna Be (500 miles) was re-edited with clips from the movie. The inclusion of the song within Benny & Joon helped popularize the song in the United States.

I'm Gonna Be (500 miles) was also the theme song for the Swedish TV-show, High Chaparall. It was also featured in How I Met Your Mother episode "Arrivederci, Fiero" and the Season 5 episode "Duel Citizenship".

The song was also very popular in Spain in the late 1990s thanks to TV advertisements. It was a reference song for the ads of one of the first telecommunications companies, Retevisión.

On 11 September 2010, Matthew Wilkening of AOL Radio ranked the original version of the song at #50 on the list of the 100 Worst Songs Ever, exclaiming, "We're halfway through our list! Doesn't it feel like your ears have walked through 500 miles of bad songs?"

The song has been associated with Terry Fox's Marathon of Hope for cancer. This was the favorite song of Liu Peiwen and his girlfriend Ling Hsueh, and she told him if he walked 1000 miles, she'd try to get her mother to let her marry him. So he walked the distance of 1000 miles from his city to hers (and they got married.) It became an international news item in 2011, and was featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not in 2012.

Covers

The cover of this song by Steven Curtis Chapman was played by NASA as the wakeup call to the crew of the International Space Station and STS-130 on Flight Day 14/15.

In 2009, the winner of the annual Eurovision contest, Alexander Rybak performed a cover of this song.

In 2011, the song was remixed for a club play by U.S. music producer, Joel Dickinson.

On October 30, 2011, a video of the cast and crew of Doctor Who singing and dancing to this song was discovered and circulated widely on Tumblr, thus initiating the first annual "500 Miles Day" in which The Proclaimers made a cameo.

Track listing

Original 1988 version

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

The song was used in a Molson Canadian commercial.

Charts

End of year chart (1993)	Position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	27

Covers

• Down By Law - 500 Miles released in 1994
• Scotsman George Donaldson of Celtic Thunder, on their 2009 album Take Me Home
• Alexander Rybak, on his 2009 album Fairytales
• MXPX, on their 2009 album On The Cover II.
• Alvin and the Chipmunks, on their 2007 video game Alvin and the Chipmunks.
• 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.
• Steven Curtis Chapman, on his album All About Love.
• Phish, on 30 December 1997 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.
• Najwa Nimri, on her album Walkabout.
• In 2010, the song was parodied by The Fringemunks to recap Fringe episode 2.17, "White Tulip".
• The Flying Pickets.
• Vlogger Hank Green performed a cover of this song in 2007 as a punishment from his brother.

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. This version was released as a charity single for Comic Relief on 19 March 2007. It reached No. 3 on the official UK Singles Chart on download sales alone, and one week later reached No. 1, 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.

Kay also directed a video clip of the song featuring himself as Brian Potter, Lucas as Andy, David Walliams as Lou, The Proclaimers and an audience of celebrity guests: of Johnny Ball, David Beckham, David Bellamy, Dusty Bin, Tony Blackburn, Stan Boardman, Basil Brush, Bob the Builder, Bucks Fizz, Cannon and Ball, Bob Carolgees & Spit the Dog, Jasper Carrott, Keith Chegwin, Jimmy Cricket, Tess Daly, Bobby Davro (referred to in the lyrics), Carol Decker, Lesley Garrett, Claire Grogan, Paul Henry, Frazer Hines, Siobhan Redmond (credited as "Her off Holby City", Elton John, The Krankies, Burt Kwouk, Bonnie Langford, Eddie Large, Michael Le Vell, Limahl, Kenny Lynch, Des Lynam, Timmy Mallett, Amanda Mealing, Jennie McAlpine, Terry Nutkins, Bill Oddie, Paul O'Grady, Postman Pat, Wendi Peters, Robert Powell, Rod, Jane and Freddy, Rupert the Bear, Showaddywaddy, Status Quo, Kathy Staff, Frank Sidebottom, Sonia, Dennis Taylor, David Tennant, Willie Thorne, Kate Thornton, Dave Lee Travis, Louis Walsh, Pete Waterman, Lizzie Webb, Sally Whittaker, June Whitfield and Gary Wilmot. Osama bin Laden (then still a fugitive terrorist), Lord Lucan (missing since 1974) and Shergar (a race horse) are credited as appearing in the video. It was broadcast during the Comic Relief 2007: The Big One TV special.

References

Preceded by "Walk This Way" by Sugababes vs. Girls Aloud

United Kingdom number-one single (Comic Relief version) 25 March 2007 - 8 April 2007

Succeeded by "Give It to Me" by Timbaland featuring Nelly Furtado and Justin Timberlake