Cannonball

Little Mix is a female quartet comprising Jade Thirlwall, Perrie Edwards, Jesy Nelson and Leigh-Anne Pinnock. They were put together as a band by X Factor producers during the bootcamp stage of the 2011 auditions for the television music competition and were forced to change their name from Rhythmix following complaints from a children's music charity of the same name. Little Mix became the first band to win X Factor after being mentored by N Dubz singer Tulisa Contostavlos. This is their debut single, which was released digitally the following morning. Tulisa's N Dubz colleague and boyfriend Fazer produced the track.

The song is a cover of an acoustic ballad originally written and recorded by Irish singer-songwriter Damien Rice. A top 20 hit in 2004, it returned to the UK singles chart in 2011 after John Adams performed it in his X Factor audition, this time peaking at #9.

Jade Thirwall comes from the same north east area as 2009 X Factor winner Joe McElderry. They are good friends and used to do duets together while performing in local youth clubs.

The song debuted at #1 on the UK singles chart selling 210,000 copies in its first week. However the song's first week sales were just under half that of 2010 winner Matt Cardle twelve months previously.

In a survey carried out by the British Heart Foundation during the 2011 festive season, this single was named as the nation's "most unwanted" Christmas present. A quarter of those questioned named it as the gift they were least happy with beating such products such as raunchy underwear, musical ties and foot spas.