I Got Soul cover artwork

I Got Soul

In 2009 we released our first single 'I Got Soul' - by an urban music supergroup brought
together as the 'Young Soul Rebels'. The project was inspired by Bono's comments after
the legendary encore of 'All These Things That I've Done' at the end of our 2009 BRITS gig.

Referencing our work with child soldiers in Uganda and Congo, Bono told radio One the
next day "That chant, 'I've got soul, but I'm not a soldier', has a whole new meaning when
there is a War Child banner behind your head".

We decided to hand the baton from one generation of musicians to the next - and let them
take our message to a whole new audience. And so it was that the hottest urban musicians in
the UK came together one day in July to collaborate on a rework of The Killers' iconic track.

Discography

The Young Soul Rebels

  • N-Dubz
  • Pixie Lott
  • Tinchy Stryder
  • Frankmusik
  • V.V. Brown
  • Kid British
  • Chipmunk
  • Mpho
  • McLean
  • Ironik
  • Domino Go
  • Bashy
  • Egypt
  • London Community Gospel Choir
See me, I'm the type that would die for a cause but no kid should die for a war. Let's fight for a cause, pray for better days, when the going gets tough there's a better way...

Lyrics by Chipmunk

Thanks to...

Island Records, all of the Young Soul Rebels, Henry Holland and Ashley Walters.

The video

The Impact

The track reached the Top 10 in the singles charts in September 2009.

The official video had over 1 million views on YouTube.

Actor Ashley Walters recorded the story of a former child soldier supported by War Child. The video was featured on You Tube's homepage.

Fashion designer Henry Holland designed a series of T-shirts that raised both awareness and funds for our work.

We took Ironik - one of the Young Soul Rebels - to Kingsbury School in London to help the students there learn about the issues and write their own lyrics.

Over a year later, the students at Kingsbury High were still campaigning for War Child. They remixed our remix in order to create a brilliant version of the track to help us campaign about the Millennium Development Goals.