"For He's a Jolly Good Felon" is the third single from the album '' The Betrayed'', the fourth album by Welsh

alternative rock Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from Popular culture, mainstre ...

band

Lostprophets Lostprophets (stylised as lostprophets) were a Welsh rock band from Pontypridd, formed in 1997 by singer and lyricist Ian Watkins and guitarist Lee Gaze. The band was founded after their former band Fleshbind broke up. They later recruited Mike ...

. According to the band's mailing list, the single was set to be released on 11 April 2010. The single's formats included 7" vinyl (released on 12 April), a digital download, an iTunes single (including a live version of "Dirty Little Heart"), and a remix version by L'Amour La Morgue ( Ian Watkins' side project). The cover for the single was posted to Dragonninja.com on 1 March 2010. Ian Watkins admitted that the song, the music video and most of ''The Betrayed'' album were based on their upbringing. He told the Sun: "The song is about us growing up on council estates in Wales. The lyrics are about that way of life, I am not condoning it. We were good boys, it was just that our environment exposed us to anti-social behaviour. In this new album I have been very honest lyrically without a filter or producer. I have already covered areas like the conditioning of society and my anger towards it, so I suppose I just didn't want to repeat myself."

Track listing

Music video

The music video was released on 12 March 2010 to YouTube by

Visible Noise Visible Noise is a British independent record label that focuses solely on British bands. History Founded in 1998 by ex-Cacophonous Records manager Julie Weir, the label was created with the goal of fostering and breaking new UK rock music into ...

and follows the storyline of the song. Just like the previous video, " Where We Belong", it is filmed in

greyscale In digital photography, computer-generated imagery, and colorimetry, a grayscale image is one in which the value of each pixel is a single sample representing only an ''amount'' of light; that is, it carries only intensity information. Graysca ...

. Lostprophets also released a video showing the making of 'For He's a Jolly Good Felon'. This was available on YouTube on 24 March 2010. The band have also released a full-length cinematic version of the original music video. This included dialogue of the video and was released on 6 April. The video was shot in

Moss Side Moss Side is an Inner city, inner-city area of Manchester, England, south of the Manchester city centre, city centre, It had a population of 20,745 at the United Kingdom Census 2021, 2021 census. Moss Side is bounded by Hulme to the north, Cho ...

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...

. It also featured Alan Ford, known as the character Brick Top from the film '' Snatch''.

Personnel

* Ian Watkins –

lead vocals The lead vocalist in popular music is typically the member of a group or band whose voice is the most prominent melody in a performance where multiple voices may be heard. The lead singer sets their voice against the accompaniment parts of t ...

Lee Gaze Lee James Gaze (born 21 May 1975 in Pontypridd, Wales) is a Welsh musician. He is the lead guitarist, and also one of the founding members, of the Welsh/American alternative rock band No Devotion and previously a member of the Welsh rock band L ...

–

lead guitar Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featur ...

* Mike Lewis –

rhythm guitar In music performances, rhythm guitar is a technique and role that performs a combination of two functions: to provide all or part of the rhythmic pulse in conjunction with other instruments from the rhythm section (e.g., drum kit, bass guitar ...

Stuart Richardson Stuart Richardson (born 15 August 1973) is a Welsh musician. He is the bassist for the rock band No Devotion, formed by former members of Lostprophets and Geoff Rickly of Thursday. He is also the touring bassist for Thursday. Career Richardson ...

–

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

Jamie Oliver James Trevor Oliver MBE OSI (born 27 May 1975) is an English chef, restaurateur and cookbook author. He is known for his casual approach to cuisine, which has led him to front numerous television shows and open many restaurants. Oliver reache ...

–

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

synth A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and f ...

keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

, samples,

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

Ilan Rubin Ilan Rubin (born July 7, 1988) is an American musician, singer, and songwriter. He is known primarily for playing drums with bands such as Nine Inch Nails, Paramore, and Angels & Airwaves. In 2008 he formed The New Regime, in which he sings and ...

–

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

* Luke Johnson – drums, percussion

Chart performance

"For He's A Jolly Good Felon" debuted on the

UK Rock Chart The UK Rock & Metal Singles Chart and UK Rock & Metal Albums Chart are record charts compiled in the United Kingdom by the Official Charts Company (OCC) to determine the 40 most popular singles and albums in the rock and heavy metal genres. The ...

on 4 April 2010, at #19. then on 11 April 2010, the single climbed 10 places to #9. On 18 April 2010, the single climbed a further 5 places to #4. The single also entered the

UK Indie Chart The UK Independent Singles Chart and UK Independent Albums Chart are charts of the best-selling independent singles and albums, respectively, in the United Kingdom. Originally published in January 1980, and widely known as the indie chart, the rele ...

at #30. During the next week it climbed 21 places, charting at #9 on the same chart. The single however performed poorly in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

entering at #99 - one of the bands' lowest-charting singles to date. This was in spite of a campaign by the band to get the single to #1. The low entry could be because no physical single was released, & the planned vinyl release never happened due to production problems.

Notes

"For He's a Jolly Good Felon" OFFICIAL Music Video

The Making of "For He's a Jolly Good Felon"

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:For He's A Jolly Good Felon Lostprophets songs 2010 songs