The insistent chorus-‘I would walk 500 miles/ and I would walk 500 more’-is a declaration of love so grand it borders on the absurd. And yet it’s rank real. ‘If I get drunk,/ well, I know I’m gonna be/ I’m gonna be the man who gets drunk next to you./ And if I haver, hey, I know I’m gonna be/ I’m gonna be the man who’s havering to you’-they sing earnestly, ‘haver’ being Scottish for babble.
The track, its harmony like train tracks joining and separating as it chugs along its acoustic way, is a masterclass in folk-pop. And who can resist joining in with the Reids during the ‘da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da’ refrain? It’s pure earworm material.
‘I’m Gonna Be’ is not just about love, it’s about determination, resilience and obsession. It is the anthem of the fou amoureux, the love fool in all of us.
