France have caught the attention of music fans at the FIFA World Cup by using Daft Punk’s ‘One More Time’ as their goal music.
Each of the 48 competing nations have their own designated songs that play after their team scores at the tournament in the US, Mexico and Canada, but few have hit in quite the same way as France’s pick.
The iconic 2000 single, released on Daft Punk’s second album ‘Discovery’, played over the big speakers three times as France kicked off their campaign with a 3-1 win over Senegal in New Jersey on Tuesday (June 16). Their remaining group games are against Iraq on Monday (June 22) and Norway on Friday (June 26).
The national federations of each country submitted their choices to FIFA, with several other big names having also popped up. Scotland are using The Proclaimers’ ‘I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)’, South Korea picked BLACKPINK’s ‘JUMP’, Australia’s is AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ and Switzerland are using Gala’s ‘Freed From Desire’.
England’s goal music – as heard four times during their opening 4-2 win over Croatia on Wednesday (June 17) – is the 2000 Planet Funk song ‘Chase The Sun’, synonymous with its use at major darts competitions.
After the England-Croatia game, there was a moment in which the players stood and applauded on the pitch as the crowd passionately sang along with Oasis’ ‘Wonderwall’, with Jude Bellingham and Anthony Gordon among those mouthing along to the lyrics.
John Barnes recently joined New Order’s Peter Hook to perform his classic rap from ‘World In Motion’ in Manchester, while Baddiel, Skinner & Lightning Seeds have re-released their own England anthem ‘Three Lions’ for its 30th anniversary.
Belle & Sebastian recently spoke to NME about their buoyant song for Scotland’s campaign, ‘It Only Takes One Lion’, while journalist and musician JJ Bull spoke to us about his LCD Soundsystem-esque ‘The Very Unofficial Scotland World Cup Song’. Susan Boyle and Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapranos, meanwhile, have teamed up for the Irn Bru World Cup ad.
As for Daft Punk, Thomas Bangalter released his new album ‘Mirage – Ballet For 16 Dancers’ earlier this month, and recently played a B2B DJ set with Fred Again….
He also spoke about the possibility of the duo reuniting, saying he was “really happy that throughout our long run we were able to not screw it up”, but adding “staying in character and not spoiling it became very difficult”.