The Foo Fighters and Rick Astley Cleverly Rickroll the Audience at the Summer Sonic Festival in Japan

Lori Dorn
August 21, 2017

While performing at the 2017 Summer Sonic Festival in Osaka, Japan, the fabulous Foo Fighters asked singer Rick Astley to join them onstage and began playing the opening notes of the classic Nirvana song “Smells Like Teen Spirit“. After a few measures, the song quickly turned into a rocking version Astley’s most popular hit “Never Gonna Give You Up“, which caused many audience members to realize that they had just been Rickrolled.

Thank you 'Summer sonic' just had one of the best nights of my life !!! My gig was great then @foofighters ! Just nuts !
Lovely people ?X pic.twitter.com/rPMSqhcesj

— Rick Astley (@rickastley) August 20, 2017

https://t.co/AKJYUUApXX pic.twitter.com/2036HD7c8R

— Foo Fighters (@foofighters) August 20, 2017

In 2009, Thriftshop XL mashed the two songs together, which may have given the performers the idea to do it live.

Lori Dorn

Lori is a Laughing Squid Contributing Editor based in New York City who has been writing blog posts for over a decade. She also enjoys making jewelry, playing guitar, taking photos and mixing craft cocktails.