Alistair Griffin tells Teesside Live about performing ahead of a Middlesbrough game and the touching song he performed

Teesside musician Alistair Griffin has told of his pride after performing his song We Shall Be at the Riverside last weekend.

As part of the build-up to the 150 Fixture against Wolves, the singer-songwriter - who was a finalist on Fame Academy in 2003 - performed the song We Shall Be from pitchside.

In what was a raucous, celebratory atmosphere at the Riverside, for three minutes at least, the sold-out crowd were silenced in complete attention, as they listened to the lyrics of a song with Teesside at its heart, which Alistair co-wrote with Cattle and Cane duo Helen and Joe Hammill.

“It was a really special moment for me,” Alistair tells Teesside Live of the performance. “Beforehand, it was a mixture of being excited to be on the pitch and obviously performing in front of 30,000 people, but it's also quite daunting!

“Technically, there's a fair bit to get right, because you're broadcasting it to the whole stadium and you want to make sure the sound is right.

“Thankfully it seems to have gone down well, and to be part of a day like that was really great. I’ve had loads of messages from fans saying they enjoyed it.”

There were personal reasons that made the performance all the more special for Alistair too.

He explained: “I had my son there, Tom [11], who's a massive Boro fan. He was a late convert to football really, but last season he got the proper Boro experience, and we went to Wembley.

“And actually my mom, it was her first time back at the Riverside in months, because she's not been very well. So it was a big day for her too.”

On a day where Boro celebrated their 150-year anniversary as a club, the beautiful lyrics captivated a Teesside audience as fans began to take their seats ahead of kick-off.

The events around the birthday celebrations had been in the works for months, and the decision to invite Alistair to perform the song, while a late decision, proved a lovely touch.

“It was just in the run-up to the game, maybe a week or so before,” he said of the invite. “I've obviously had the song knocking about for a while, because we wrote it for the musical Steel and Iron a few years ago.

“When we went to Wembley I did a little montage of me and Tom at Wembley and I put it out with the song over it, and quite a few Boro fans saw it and were saying things like ‘this could be something’.

“It kind of went away and I forgot all about it. But someone at the club had seen it and it all started there really.”

Alistair is no stranger to writing songs that strike a chord with sports fans. There was the ode to Mark Viduka based on Leonard Cohen's ‘Hallelujah’.

His song Just Drive, meanwhile, was used on an F1 montage and later became the title track of Sky Sports’ F1 coverage. He also wrote The Road as the official song for the 2014 Tour de France.

We Shall Be wasn’t initially written as a song about Boro, but instead about the town. It was written with Helen and Joe from Cattle and Cane for the musical Iron and Steel, which was produced by Steve Gibson’s daughter Katie, and was performed at the Riverside in 2022 and starred Boro legend Bernie Slaven.

“Myself and Helen and Joe Hammill from Cattle and Cane were asked to write music for the show,” he explained of the song. “At that point there wasn’t a script so we were looking at themes around Middlesbrough.

“Obviously it was about the history of Middlesbrough. I knew that the town motto was ‘Erimus’ or ‘We shall be’ and so we started looking at it.

“The song is about the town, it's about the industry, but it's about the identity of people coming into the town as well, like 100-and-odd years ago when the steelworks and things like that first started. It's about identity.

“We started thinking, well, actually, this has got a lot to do with being a football fan and a Middlesbrough supporter. So, the whole thing kind of wrapped up in that.

“We wanted something anthemic, and we went for the big anthemic chorus with ‘We shall be’. For me, it was an easy thing to relate to because I am a Middlesbrough supporter, and I have that sense of pride that comes with that.

“That emotion you feel, particularly supporting a club like the Boro. I remember saying to Joe when we were finishing writing the song, ‘I feel like we’ve really captured something here’, and then you just hope it catches on.”

It certainly captured the hearts of many Boro fans at the Riverside last weekend. The song has risen to become Alistair’s third most-played song on Spotify.

As for the day, after his emotional performance, Alistair took his seat next to son Tom and his mam to watch Boro record an important win over promotion rivals Wolves. He’s feeling good about Boro’s chances this season.

“It was a great day and big win,” he said. “I was sitting in the car with my uncle on the way to the match, and he said, ‘This is an important game. If we can win this, this feels like a turning point’. Wolves are obviously a very good team.

“I feel good about it this season. I've felt good ever since Kim Hellberg came in, really. I love him as a manager and as a person.

“I think he's a lot to do with the feeling, and there's such a good feeling around Middlesbrough and the club at the minute.

“It's like that sort of togetherness which I think is important. Just listening to the players, there's a difference this time, there's a positivity that we haven't had for a while, I don’t think.”

You can listen to We Shall Be on Spotify and other music streaming platforms now.