You’ll Never Walk Alone (Liverpool FC Anthem)

“You’ll Never Walk Alone” was originally written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II for the 1946 musical “Carousel”. In 1963, the Merseybeat group Gerry and the Pacemakers covered the track in 1963.

The Gerry and the Pacemakers cover of the track ended up being sung by fans of the Liverpool FC club in 1963, which led to it being the football anthem of the club, and led to them adopting the line “You’ll Never Walk Alone” as their official motto on their coat of arms. According to former Liverpool player Tommy Smith, lead vocalist of Gerry and the Pacemakers Gerry Marsden presented the manager at the time Bill Shankly with their cover of the song on a trip in the summer of 1963: “Shanks was in awe of what he heard. … Football writers from the local newspapers were travelling with our party and, thirsty for a story of any kind between games, filed copy back to their editors to the effect that we had adopted Gerry Marsden’s forthcoming single as the club song.” The song also gained a new meaning and symbolism in  April 1989 after the Hillsborough disaster, where there were 96 deaths and 766 injuries due to a fatal human crush at a match in Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, where the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. To this day, it is still considered the worst disaster in British sporting history.

The music video for the track was uploaded to YouTube in January 2013. It features the Liverpool fans singing the track to a camera, all shown in black and white. As of June 2020, the video has 36.5 million views and almost a quarter of a million likes.

Yesterday on the 25th June 2020, Liverpool FC were crowned the Premier League Champions after a 30-year wait.

Release Date: October 1963

Lyricist: Oscar Hammerstein II

Composer: Richard Rogers

Producer: George Martin

Label/s: Columbia (EMI) (UK) & Laurie Records (US)

Chart Rankings: When Gerry & The Pacemakers released their version of the song in 1963, it charted at #1 in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand and the UK.

The lyrics to “You’ll Never Walk Alone” can be accessed here: LINK