Cheeky Monkeys
NME, April 2005
GORILLAZ have taken advantage of the new chart rules combing single and downloads sales to get new song ‘FEEL GOOD INC’ into the charts three weeks early.
Under the system introduced last week (April 11), once a single gets a physical release legal downloads of that song are also counted towards its chart total.
Having made a download of ‘Feel Good Inc’ available since March, when the band issued a limited edition 7” of the single last week both became eligible for the UK singles chart, hence it debuted yesterday (April 17) at Number 21 despite it not actually being released properly until May 9.
“OK, let's clear this up. There's a number of 7-inch vinyl copies of the new Gorillaz single that have gone out in advance of the 'official' release date,” explained bassist Murdoc of the situation. “This apparently means that because we have some 'product' out, that every downloaded version of 'Feel Good Inc' from the Internet counts towards a proper chart placing. It turns out that because the download charts are combining with the regular charts for the first time ever, our single is going Top Forty before it's even come out. Magic! This is like an episode of ‘Soap’.”
He added that the band rejected any criticism of cheating the new system: “So some people are saying we've been cheeky and maybe bent the rules, in order to gain this placing. Bad sport or something. I say so what. You're just kicking yourself that you didn't think of it first.”
‘Feel Good Inc’ will now be released properly on all formats in three weeks time on May 9.
Under the system introduced last week (April 11), once a single gets a physical release legal downloads of that song are also counted towards its chart total.
Having made a download of ‘Feel Good Inc’ available since March, when the band issued a limited edition 7” of the single last week both became eligible for the UK singles chart, hence it debuted yesterday (April 17) at Number 21 despite it not actually being released properly until May 9.
“OK, let's clear this up. There's a number of 7-inch vinyl copies of the new Gorillaz single that have gone out in advance of the 'official' release date,” explained bassist Murdoc of the situation. “This apparently means that because we have some 'product' out, that every downloaded version of 'Feel Good Inc' from the Internet counts towards a proper chart placing. It turns out that because the download charts are combining with the regular charts for the first time ever, our single is going Top Forty before it's even come out. Magic! This is like an episode of ‘Soap’.”
He added that the band rejected any criticism of cheating the new system: “So some people are saying we've been cheeky and maybe bent the rules, in order to gain this placing. Bad sport or something. I say so what. You're just kicking yourself that you didn't think of it first.”
‘Feel Good Inc’ will now be released properly on all formats in three weeks time on May 9.