Heads-down, no-nonsense boogie legends Status Quo have collaborated with UK retail giant Marks & Spencer for rerecorded version of the classic Rockin' All Over The World.
Rockin' All Over The World originally appeared as the opening track on John Fogerty's self-titled solo album in 1975, and was covered two years later by The Quo, when it was released as a single and climbed into the UK Top Three. Most famously, it was the first song played at Live Aid in 1985. And now its lyrics have been rewritten to celebrate M&S's "Remarksable [sic] Value" range of produce.
Here we are and here we are and here we go
Remarksable value means the prices are low
Here we go
Saving all over the store
I get your dinner started with a dining deal
I look for prices where the values are real
Here we go
Saving it all over the store
And so on.
"They say you don’t need to reinvent the classics, but we had a lot of fun re-recording one of our greatest hits for M&S," says Status Quo leader Francis Rossi. "All thanks to a suggestion from a lovely lad called Jack – apparently he’s done several viral videos about how good value M&S Food is, so we thought we’d beat him at his own game."
The Jack in question is Jack Norbury, a retail sales manager from Wiltshire, who has racked up millions of views for his value-themed videos on the official TikTik account of the M&S store in Devizes. Norbury had written to company CEO Stuart Machin suggesting a song that other stores could use on their TikTok accounts, and here we are.
“It’s not every day you get a call saying the marketing director at M&S Food has asked you to re-record one of your greatest hits for them," says Rossi. "But sure, why not? Their new Purley Way store is my closest so the wife and I have been in there quite a bit – big fan of their Our Best Ever prawn sandwich, I must say.”
Status Quo have form with this sort of thing. Back in 2013, the band collaborated with Australian supermarket chain Coles to produce an altered version of their 1974 single Down Down, with the lyrics changed ("Coles mince, prices are down / Down down, prices are down") to reflect the remarkable value of Coles' meat products during an undoubtedly savage price war with retail competitor Woolworths.
