Promise This debuted at number one on the Official Singles Chart in its first week, selling over 157,000 copies. It outsold Rihanna’s energizing Only Girl (In The World) by over 30,000 chart sales (although Riri would overtake Cheryl the next week and take the top spot for herself).
Cheryl’s Promise This has surpassed Rihanna to the top of the charts
Watching the live performance of Promise This now serves as a succinct reminder of Cheryl’s popularity at the time. When she walked out on that stage, she was the biggest pop star in the country, bar none – the reception she received was comparable to a gladiator entering the Colosseum.
When a pop music fan of a certain age hears the words ‘Cheryl’ (Cole, Fernandez-Versini, Just Cheryl) and ‘X Factor,’ two images come to mind. 1.) Newcastle’s favorite daughter dressed up as a soldier performing Fight For This Love, and 2.)
As the opening bars of Promise This blast out, the star with cherry-red hair dances in spiraling, striped tights.
Promise is the theatrical lead single from Cheryl’s second album Messy Little Raindrops. This is inspired by her near-fatal encounter with malaria earlier that year, as well as her divorce from ex-husband Ashley Cole.
Promise This, like Fight For This Love before it, became a clever way for Cheryl to address and respond to media speculation about her life without compromising herself in any way.
However, Promise cannot be denied. This is an odd pop record. It’s the polar opposite of the Cheryl we met on her first album, with dramatic production flourishes, choppy French middle eights, and lyrics about “dying before I wake.”
Most impressive is how the song’s many grating parts manage to work together instead of tearing each other apart.
Surprisingly, more than any other Cheryl single. Promise This would fit right in with Girls Aloud’s sonically inventive back catalog.
Promise This debuted at number one on the Official Singles Chart in its first week, selling over 157,000 copies. It outsold Rihanna’s energizing Only Girl (In The World) by over 30,000 chart sales (although Riri would overtake Cheryl the next week and take the top spot for herself).
Promise is Cheryl’s second UK number one single. This song now has 498,000 chart sales and 6.3 million total UK streams. OfficialCharts.com revealed last year that it was Cheryl’s fourth most-popular solo single in the UK.
