Seven Nation Army

March 7, 2003

Seven Nation Army by the White Stripes is the first single from their album Elephant. The single was released on 13 May 2003.

The song was of several U.S. and British music magazines (including Q and NME ) of the ten best guitar songs of all time selected. Cover versions there are, among others, Flaming Lips, Hard-Fi, Audio Slave, Jamie Cullum, Chris Liebing, The Dynamics, Kate Nash, The BossHoss, Ben l' Oncle Soul and Marcus Collins.

The guitar riff is heard during much of the song, was created when improvising during a sound check before a concert by the White Stripes in Melbourne.

The name Seven Nation Army comes, according to Jack White from himself, he would have as a child instead of Salvation Army (English Salvation Army) Seven Nation Army said.

The music video was created, directed by Alex and Martin and shows a seemingly endless journey through a tunnel of black, white and red triangles at the edges at some points of the video armed human skeletons, reminiscent of soldiers marching.

In Germany, the song received in 2010 for more than 150,000 copies sold a gold record.

Cultural Significance

Gained popularity of the song in particular by European football fans who sing provided the melody with his own texts. So the guitar riff of the song was first nachgesungen in a UEFA Champions League match of fans of FC Bruges in the season 2003/ 04. After the UEFA Cup match FC Bruges against AS Roma in 2006, the song also in the Italian league was very well known. After the victory of the Italian national team at the World Cup 2006 in Germany the reef for anthem of Italian fans was. Meanwhile, the reef of fans of many other clubs has been adapted for their stadium chants. Also known as Torhymne he became increasingly popular. He was also highlighted during the invasion of the national teams in the stadiums at the 2008 European Championship in Austria and Switzerland. Because of the single release in 2008 reached # 4 on the German single sales charts five years after its publication in early July.

Seven Nation Army is repeatedly used in casting shows for performances of candidates. Became popular version of Percival in The Voice of Germany that could be sold as downloadable titles and reached 2012 45th place in the German single charts in February.

A modified version of the song is part of the soundtrack of the action film "GI Joe - The settlement 'and is used in the trailers of the film.