Amazon success for World Cup anthem

The campaign to get Rik Mayall's World Cup anthem to top the charts is celebrating an early success.

The song Noble England – based on Shakespeares's 'Once more unto the breach' speech from Henry V – is currently top of the Amazon download chart.

And it is No 15 on iTunes.

It follows a campaign to 'hijack' the charts to honour the comic in the week he died, at the age of 56. A Facebook page backing the idea has amassed more than 10,000 likes in little over 24 hours.

No 1 singles typically sell 60,000 to 100,000 copies.

Campaign organisers including DJ Jon Morter, who successfully pushed Rage Against The Machine to the 2009 Christmas No 1 in protest against the X Factor, said of the early success: 'This is fantastic news, and welcome news. [We] cannot let up though, so share, buy, bribe, borrow, steal, threaten, cause insurrection. Whatever it takes.'

Mayall released Noble England for the last Wold Cup in 2010, but it failed to make much of an impact. However there is no official England song this year, leaving others to fill the gap.

Morter said: 'It would be a great thing for Rik’s memory. He was a comedy legend. It’s a vehicle for a lot of people to say something and it would be a great accolade.'

Here is the video:

Published: 11 Jun 2014