On 8 May 2022, before Arsenal beat Leeds United at the Emirates, the stadium speakers played a song by Islington singer-songwriter Louis Dunford, and thousands of supporters sang its chorus back while the players huddled in the centre circle. “I have never experienced that here, it was the first time,” Mikel Arteta said afterwards. Half a century after Jimmy Hill wrote Good Old Arsenal, the Gunners had a new anthem.
| Arsenal anthem | Key facts |
|---|---|
| Good Old Arsenal | Written by Jimmy Hill, sung by the first-team squad, 1971 |
| Tune | Rule, Britannia! |
| Chart peak | No. 16 in the UK, seven weeks on the chart |
| The Angel (North London Forever) | Louis Dunford, released 25 February 2022 on RCA |
| First big Emirates moment | Arsenal vs Leeds United, 8 May 2022 |
| Best-known terrace chant | One-Nil to the Arsenal, sung to Go West |
| Free MP3 or ringtone here? | No. Use official releases |
Good Old Arsenal and the 1971 double
The idea came from the dressing room. England had taken Back Home into the charts in 1970. Arsenal's players wanted their own record, something to stand next to Liverpool's You'll Never Walk Alone, and when an ITV competition for fan-written songs produced nothing usable because the entries were judged too wordy, the pundit Jimmy Hill asked manager Bertie Mee for permission and wrote the words himself. He borrowed the tune of Rule, Britannia!
The squad recorded it before the 1971 FA Cup final.
It entered the UK chart in May 1971 and peaked at number 16. Some fans found it bland. Then came Wembley on 8 May 1971. All three goals arrived in extra time, and Charlie George's winner against Liverpool completed Arsenal's first League and FA Cup double, the first by any club since Tottenham in 1961. Nobody was dropping the song after that. Arseblog calls it the most instantly recognisable of all Arsenal ditties. Search for the “old Arsenal anthem” and this is the one.
Cup final records and One-Nil to the Arsenal
Arsenal kept making records whenever they reached Wembley. The old version of this page credited Arsenal, We're On Your Side to a group called Gold in 2015. We found no trace of that. Arseblog lists it as the squad's 1972 cup final song, released before a 1-0 defeat to Leeds United on 6 May 1972, and it was not kind about the tune.
Roll Out the Red Carpet followed in 1978. Shouting for the Gunners, by Tippa Irie and Peter Hunnigale, reached number 35 in 1993. Hot Stuff, a reworking of the Donna Summer hit, was the last official Arsenal FA Cup final song in 1998.
The chant that outlived them all was never released by the club. One-Nil to the Arsenal is sung to Go West, the Village People song revived by the Pet Shop Boys. It grew out of George Graham's mean defence. Its birthplace is disputed. According to 90min, some fans trace it to a 1-0 win over Manchester City in September 1992; others point to the 1994 Cup Winners' Cup semi-final first leg in Paris, where the Pet Shop Boys version reportedly played at half-time with Arsenal ahead through Ian Wright.
The away end picked it up. It never stopped.
How The Angel became North London Forever
Dunford grew up on Popham Street. He released The Angel in February 2022, supporters shared clips online, and he tweeted at the club asking them to play it. He later told 90min it was a joke. “I woke up and it had exploded overnight,” he said.
Arteta noticed.
The manager invited Dunford to the training ground to meet the squad. By the Leeds game the chorus was known word for word in the stands, and Dunford's message to fans that week was short: the song belonged to them now. It is now played before home games at the Emirates. That is why many younger supporters type “Arsenal anthem” and expect this track, not a 1971 single. Liverpool have had a pre-match ritual like this for decades, as our guide to the Liverpool anthem explains, and Real Madrid built theirs around Hala Madrid.
Looking for an Arsenal anthem MP3 or ringtone?
This page used to host free MP3 downloads and full lyrics. Both are gone. We do not hold the rights to the recordings or the words, and unofficial files on download sites are often mislabelled or poor quality.
The legal routes are simple. The Angel came out on RCA Records and is on the major streaming services under Dunford's name, along with licensed lyrics. For Good Old Arsenal and the old cup final records, check the streaming catalogues and Arsenal's official YouTube and social channels before trusting a random file. For a ringtone, clip a track you have legally bought or downloaded through a paid service. Our Manchester United anthem page takes the same approach.
Our view: why Nigerian Gooners still care
Arsenal have a big following here. A NOI Polls survey of Nigerian Premier League fans in 2016 put them third on 19 per cent, behind Chelsea and Manchester United. Akinwunmi, who started the Lagos-based Nigerian Arsenal Fans page in 2019, went further in a 2024 interview with GOAL: “sometimes I think the support here is deeper than it is in England,” he said. Alex Iwobi helped too. He came through the Arsenal academy, made his debut in 2015 and played 148 games before joining Everton in 2019, giving Super Eagles fans a personal reason to follow the club.
North London Forever is a song about a few streets in Islington. Lagos sings it anyway.
This article was most recently revised and updated 14 seconds ago
