Rickrolling comes to vinyl with this laborious prank

We salute you, noble prankster, for reviving such an ancient tradition

Foolish one, to think the Rickroll could have become an ancient relic. 

The viral prank of misleading links to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" is alive and well; taken to an entire new level thanks to Reddit user dream_logic. The Rickroll's now stepped out of the digital world, and into the real one.

The post, entitled "How I Rickrolled my vinyl collector friend IRL", details the user's chance encounter with a copy of Rick Astley's notorious single at a local record store. And the mischevious plan it sparked in their mind. 

Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" (Reddit/dream_logic)

A decoy was soon found, Perfume Genius' third album Too Bright. A real treat for this vinyl-obsessed friend.

Perfume Genius' Too Bright (Reddit/dream_logic)

The user took photos of Too Bright's labels, front and back. They then found a record label template and scaled the photos to size on a computer, before printing them out on adhesive paper.

Perfume Genius' Too Bright vinyl label (Reddit/dream_logic)

Resizing the labels on a computer (Reddit/dream_logic)

Printing the labels (Reddit/dream_logic)

The labels were cut out and stuck to the Astley record, "It's not perfect but I hoped he wouldn't look too closely before playing it!"; with the whole thing then wrapped both in plastic (claiming the record was used) and Christmas wrapping paper.

Pasting the labels on Rickey Astley's record (Reddit/dream_logic)

The Astley record in the decoy sleeve (Reddit/dream_logic)

The record wrapped and ready for Rickrolling (Reddit/dream_logic)

Unfortunately, the user wasn't able to capture the victim's reaction when the record first played as, "it all happened so fast when he actually went to put it on, I was just focused on not giving away the surprise." We imagine it was a little something like this, though.

Don't worry, the friend eventually received the right gift. Rickrolling is about sharing the love (and Rick Astley-based joy); not about being a bad friend.