25 years to the day since Baddiel, Skinner, and Lightning Seeds brought the iconic footballing anthem ‘Three Lions’ into the world, Sony Music announce the release of a special limited edition vinyl to mark the anniversary. The one-off issue, which can be pre-ordered from today, will be available on 7” solid red vinyl on 4th June and will include ‘Three Lions ‘98’ on the B-side. It is the first time the track has been available on vinyl since its original release in 1996.
The limited edition run marks 25 years since The FA approached Lightning Seeds’ Ian Broudie to write the official Euro ‘96 track with comedians David Baddiel and Frank Skinner. An earworm of a track that summed up the heartache and hope of being an England fan, it became an instant number one, with England fans up and down the country singing it before, during, and after games. Sadly for England, a semi-final penalty shootout against Germany ended their hopes, but two years later Broudie, Baddiel and Skinner recorded a new version ‘Three Lions ‘98’ for the 1998 World Cup, which also topped the charts.
In the years since its debut, the track has seen multiple releases and is the only song in existence to have become the UK number one four separate times with the same artists: two one-week stints in 1996, three straight weeks in 1998 for the remake, and again in 2018 during the World Cup held in Russia, where it made history in vaulting to number one from 24 in one week. Not just adored by England fans, ‘Three Lions’ has become a global footballing hit, with Germany even adopting it as their national football anthem.
The football banger has also hit some impressive milestones over the years. When England reached the 2018 World Cup semi-finals after knocking out Sweden, the track was streamed 1.3m times in a day, even surpassing Calvin Harris’ ‘One Kiss’. Fans also took to the song after another heartbreaking England exit from the tournament, with the track being streamed 9.7 million times following England’s semi-final defeat to Croatia. Since its release in 1996, ‘Three Lions’ has been streamed over 38.4m times, had 88k downloads, and over 33m video views.
Those familiar words “It’s coming home” will soon be on everyone’s lips, with England opening up its Euro 2020 campaign against Croatia on 13 June. Whether you remember hearing it for the first time at Euro ‘96 or in more recent years, now is the time to get your hands on some one-off memorabilia ready in time for Euro ‘20.
SONY MUSIC MARK 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF ‘THREE LIONS’ WITH LTD EDITION 7” VINYL, OUT 4TH JUNE
