Joe McElderry Graceful In Defeat As Rage Against the Machine Win Christmas Race
The 1992 released track from American Rock band Rage Against The Machine, Killing In The Name, has claimed victory in what was certainly the most entertaining and competitive race in several years for the UK’s Christmas top selling track.
At the time of its original release, more than seventeen years ago, the song had reached number 25 in the charts.
This time around, the groups’ Killing In The Name track managed to sell a highly respectable 500,000 copies, in the process outperforming The Climb by X Factor winner Joe McElderry. Rage Against The Machine edged out the young pop talent show winner with a further 50,000 copies to claim number one in the singles competition.
The success surrounding Killing In The Name Of, stemmed from an aggressive Facebook campaign masterminded for the soul purpose of stopping one of Simon Cowell’s protégés to reach the top spot.
Big winners this incredible 2-week race were undeniably music retailers.
One of them dubbed the outcome as truly remarkable, adding that the result was probably the biggest chart upset in history.
Rage Against The Machine frontman Zack De La Rocha, being interviewed on the Radio 1 chart show, expressed his happiness at reaching number one in the UK, adding that the band was very ecstatic about the result. De La Rocha promised the band would celebrate their chart win with a free UK gig in 2010.
He said the campaign’s purpose was to combat what he called ‘the sterile pop mentality’.
As for the eighteen-year-old X Factor winner Joe McElderry, he praised the campaign and its outcome, saying that he was happy to have been part of exciting and hyper-hyped battle.
The budding star was obviously gracious in defeat and didn’t seem to hold any sort of grudges towards the camoaign initiators or the band Rage Against The Machine.
It’s been said that McElderry didn’t actually lose the race, boasting similar sales as past X Factor winners.
The campaign and the use of the Killing In The Name, basically a protest song, was built around a sense of tiredness of the blatant dominance of the X Factor show in recent years and what many consider music void of any flavour and personality.
X Factor winners have won all four of the last Christmas number ones. The absolutely stunning Alexandra Burke created one of UK’s best selling Christmas singles ever with her version of Hallelujah last year.
Last four winners were:
2005: Shayne Ward, That’s My Goal
2006: Leona Lewis, A Moment Like This
2007: Leon Jackson, When You Believe
2008: Alexandra Burke, Hallelujah