| "Grace Kelly" | ||||
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| Single by Mika | ||||
| from the album Life in Cartoon Motion | ||||
| B-side |
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| Released | 8 January 2007 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 3:05 | |||
| Label | ||||
| Songwriter(s) |
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| Producer(s) | Greg Wells | |||
| Mika singles chronology | ||||
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| Music video | ||||
| "MIKA - Grace Kelly" on YouTube | ||||
| Music video | ||||
| "MIKA - Grace Kelly (Extended Version) (Official Music Video)" on YouTube | ||||
"Grace Kelly" is a song by British singer Mika. It was released as the lead single from Mika's debut studio album Life in Cartoon Motion (2007) on the 8th January 2007. It was written by Mika alongside Jodi Marr, John Merchant and Dan Warner. The song was produced and mixed by Greg Wells.
The song entered the UK Singles Chart at number three and the UK Official Download Chart at number one. One week later, it jumped to the top of the UK Singles Chart on download sales alone, the second song to do so after Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" the previous year. The track was number one on the UK Singles Chart for five weeks, and ended 2007 as the year's third biggest-selling single in that country.[1] In the US, "Grace Kelly" was made available for digital download on 16 January 2007. This song was also No. 89 on MTV Asia's list of Top 100 Hits of 2007.[2] It was designed to be a mocking satire of musicians who try to reinvent themselves to be popular.
The song is titled after Academy Award-winning American film and stage actress, and Princess of Monaco, Grace Kelly. The bit of dialogue used in the song is from the film The Country Girl, which stars Kelly. Mika claims the song was inspired after a bad experience with a record company executive, in which he was told to be more like Craig David.[3] The lyric "So I tried a little Freddie" is a reference to Queen's Freddie Mercury, to whose singing voice Mika's has been compared.[4] On at least one occasion, Mika confirmed that he used the main melody from Figaro's famous aria "Largo al factotum", from the opera The Barber of Seville by Gioachino Rossini.[5] Mika performed the song at the MTV Europe Music Awards 2007 in Munich and at the 2008 BRIT Awards at the Earls Court Exhibition Centre, London, where it was nominated for Best British Single, but lost to "Shine" by Take That.[6] The song has sold over 630,000 copies in the UK, as stated by the Official Charts Company.
- ^ "Top 40 Singles of the Year 2007" Archived 25 May 2012 at archive.today. BBC Music. Retrieved 27 December 2007
- ^ MTV Asia. "Top 100 Hits List" Archived 22 December 2007 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 27 December 2007
- ^ Times UK – "Oh, Mika, you're so fine" Archived 15 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 15 May 2009
- ^ "Entertainment – Sound of 2007: Mika". 5 January 2007. Archived from the original on 25 March 2007. Retrieved 25 February 2017.
- ^ Mika in "Taratata" TV Show (part 2) on YouTube
- ^ "The BRITs 2008" Archived 21 October 2012 at the Wayback Machine Brit Awards. Retrieved 6 November 2012