Richard Paul Astley (born February 6, 1966 in Newton-le-willows, Lancashire) is a pop and soul musician best known for his 1987 single "Never Gonna Give You Up." At the time of its release, the song peaked at number one on the year-end charts in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, West Germany, and a dozen other countries. In the 2000s the song gained renewed popularity as an Internet bait-and-switch meme in which the link to the "Never Gonna Give You Up" music video is embedded in seemingly unrelated content. When people click on the link and open the music video, they are said to have been "rickrolled." Rickrolling has taken many forms, including through email, various peer-to-peer messaging platforms, text, social media, and much else. The music video for "Never Gonna Give You Up" has over 1.5 billion views.