Song of the Week: Europe - Final Countdown

"The Final Countdown" is a synth rock song by the Swedish rock band Europe written by Joey Tempest. It was the first single released from the band's third studio album, The Final Countdown, in 1986. It is the band's most recognizable and popular song. The song reached No. 1 in 25 countries, including the United Kingdom. In the United States the song peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100 and 18 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. The single was certified gold in the United Kingdom in 1986.The song's lyrics were inspired by David Bowie's song "Space Oddity".

When it was time to choose the first single from the album The Final Countdown, Tempest suggested the song "The Final Countdown". Originally the band had never planned to release the song as a single, and some members wanted "Rock the Night" to be the first single. "The Final Countdown" was written to be an opening song for concerts, and they never thought it would be a hit. But when their record company Epic Records suggested that it should be the first single, the band decided to release it.

The song enjoys notable popularity in many sports arenas and stadiums; public address booths have often played the opening keyboard riff to rally the home crowd; it has also become a staple of high school and college pep bands for this same purpose. It was also frequently used in the American television show Arrested Development as the opening theme of G.O.B.'s magic show. The song was used for the American commercial of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games and is used as an entrance theme for professional wrestler Bryan Danielson in Ring of Honor. It was the unofficial song of the Eurobasket 1987 held in Athens, Greece (it was the main song theme played during the time-outs) and it is still heavily associated with both the introductions of the Detroit Pistons at their home games at The Palace of Auburn Hills as well as the surprise and unprecedented victory of the Greek Men's Basketball team over the team of the Soviet Union in the last seconds of that Cup final (1987). It has been used as the opening theme for Henry Green's weekly radio show "Radio Therapy" on WQLT for several years and continues to see widespread airplay on similar Classic Hits and Classic Rock radio stations. On The Singing Bee, it was used preceding the final round, called "The Final Countdown." The song has been used in the video games SingStar '80s, Saints Row 2 and Lego Rock Band. In 2010, the song was used in trailers for the third series of the 1980s-set BBC One television drama Ashes to Ashes.



The video, directed by the acclaimed Nick Morris, contains footage from two concerts the band did at Solnahallen in Solna, Sweden on May 26 and 27, 1986, as well as some extra footage filmed at the sound checks for those concerts.

The song has been covered by various artists, both local and famous; including the London Symphony Orchestra, Freezepop, After Forever, Dannii Minogue, Gigatrón, Geoff Downes, The Protomen, Norther, Dispatched, the Toy Dolls, Immolation, Leif Garrett, Furillo, Vision Divine, The Delegates, Grimethorpe Colliery Band, Stone, and the Latvian cello band Melo-M. Slovenian avant-garde group Laibach made a rework of the song for their NATO album, they also recorded a promo clip. Contrary to popular belief, the melodic death metal band Children of Bodom has never done a cover version of the song - the wrongly credited versions are usually those by Norther and Dispatched. There's even a list of the best and worst Final Countdown covers :)