Rik Mayall gets into pop charts at number seven with World Cup song

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2014/jun/16/rik-mayall-world-cup-song

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The late comic Rik Mayall's 2010 World Cup song Noble England has gone straight into the Top 10 of the UK's official singles chart.

The track, which was recorded for the last World Cup, failed to chart then but has now gone in at number seven, thanks to a social media campaign set up in his memory after his death on Monday. Mayall said of the track in 2010: "Football chants are one of the great traditions of following football and Shakespeare is also part of our national heritage. It seemed only natural that they should go together.

"I'm doing my bit, just like every other Englishman. As we stand shoulder-to-shoulder, doing out bit, stiff upper lip - apart from when you're screaming out the lyrics to Noble England."

The campaign to back Mayall's track was kicked off by Jon Morter, the man behind Rage Against The Machine's victory over X Factor winner Joe McElderry in the 2009 Christmas number one race, the Official Charts Company said.

Mayall suffered from an "acute cardiac event" after returning from a morning run, his widow said this week.

Barbara Mayall said her family had received "thousands and thousands of messages of condolence" from around the world.

She said: "We always knew that Rik was well loved but we are all overwhelmed by so many joining us in our grief."

The 2012 X Factor contestant Ella Henderson, 18, topped the official singles chart with Ghost, co-written by OneRepublic frontman Ryan Tedder, while the official anthem of the World Cup, We Are One (Ole Ola), by Pitbull, Jennifer Lopez and Claudia Leitte entered at 29.

More than 132,000 copies of Henderson's single Ghost were purchased in the UK over the past seven days, earning the 18-year-old from Tetney in Lincolnshire the fourth fastest selling single of the year so far, according to the Official Charts Company's sales data.

Kasabian have ended Sam Smith's two-week stand at number one on the official albums chart with their album 48:13. Coldplay hold firm at number two for a third week with Ghost Stories, while Smith's In The Lonely Hour is down two to number three.