Now this is an interesting story. The Struts released their debut album in the UK last year, where it went virtually unnoticed, just about scraping the top 75 albums, with none of their singles gaining any notice whatsoever. However, in an unexpected twist, "Could Have Been Me" has blown up in the USA in the past few weeks, going top 10 in the rock and alternative Billboard Charts, with the band performing on Jimmy Kimmel. They've just released a new video for 'Could Have Been Me', which has been directed by the same guy who directed "Ray of Light" for Madonna. The song's got some Queen vibes to it, it's been co-written by the guys behind some of Cheryl's stuff (edit - the song doesn't actually start until 1:20 in) -

 

 

So do you think this will come back and be a hit back in the UK, now that the USA's going wild over it? Can't really think of that many UK groups who are massive in the USA but virtually unknown back home.

I nearly got bored waiting for the song to start. There is rather more than a hint of Queen to it, particularly at the start (i.e. about 90 seconds into the video).

 

There have been a number of British acts who have been successful in the US before doing anything here over the years. Two obvious examples are Dire Straits and The Police. Radiohead also got lots of airplay on US college radio before they broke through over here. The biggest example I can think of would be Bush. For a time, they were very big in the US, but could barely sell out a pub venue in the UK. The fact that they were pretty shit didn't help.

Almost 10 years later, this has now been certified silver in the UK after going semi-viral on TikTok a couple of years ago. Halsey also covered it for the ‘Sing 2’ soundtrack in 2021.