Chasing Pavements (3:33)

“Chasing Pavements” is the second single from soul singer Adele. It was released digitally in Ireland on January 13, 2008 and entered the Irish singles chart at number 26 through download sales alone. Having received a physical release, the single then leaped nineteen places to number seven, where it peaked. On 20 January, the single entered at number two in the UK singles chart on downloads alone. Chasing Pavements was the 27th best selling single of 2008 in the UK, with over 280,000 sales

Chasing Pavements was nominated for three Grammy Awards at the 2009 Grammy Awards. The track had received nominations in the categories of Record of The Year, Song of the Year and for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. It won the award for the Best Female Vocal Performance, beating established singers such as Pink and Leona Lewis but lost out to Coldplay’s Viva la Vida in the Song of the Year category and to Robert Plant’s and Alison Krauss’ collaboration, Please Read The Letter, in the Record of the Year category.

The album the song appeared on was written about a former boyfriend. The song “Chasing Pavements” refers to an incident that occurred at 6AM one day after a fight with that person during which Adele was running down the street alone. She thought to herself “What is it you’re chasing? You’re chasing an empty pavement.”

The song’s music video, which earned a 2008 MTV Video Music Award nomination for Best Choreography, centres around a car crash occurring in Hyde Park. It was directed by Mathew Cullen of production company Motion Theory.