Premiere: New Michael Jackson video
Michael Jackson's Love Never Felt So Good got two mixes. Now it has two videos.
A video for the song featuring Justin Timberlake has more than 25 million views on YouTube. A new version, using footage of dancers from the same shoot, accompanies the Jackson-only mix and premieres at USA TODAY.
"There was so much magic we had from the original shoot, it was undeniable to create another video for the solo version of Love Never Felt So Good," says one of the video's choreographers, Tone Talauega. Tone and his brother, Rich, worked as dancers and choreographers for Jackson from 1995 on.
The video incorporates footage from such Jackson videos as Smooth Criminal and Remember the Time, as well as his 1995 MTV Video Music Awards performance of Dangerous, with dancers from a broad range of demographics dancing on sets designed to look like the originals.
"They're the youth of the day, who probably were just born around the time Michael was in his prime," says Rich. At the same time, the brothers wanted to create a diversity that fit what they knew of Jackson's personal creative vision. "We put together dancers from the technical world, the street world, boys and girls, to create a nice little gumbo of old and new, to create the hybrid that you saw on the video."
For their choreography, the Talauega brothers say they took inspiration from the work of Jackson's previous choreographers, such Vincent Paterson, Michael Peters, Jeffrey Daniel, Bruno "Pop N Taco" Falcon, LaVelle Smith Jr. and Travis Payne.
"The nucleus of everything is inspired by Michael's vocabulary of dance moves," Tone says. "We weren't trying anything new, we were just trying to capture that iconic spirit he created."
The Talauegas avoided re-creating Jackson's moves step for step, trying instead to convey both his precise brand of choreography and the impact he had on subsequent generations of fans and dancers.
"That's a hard thing to do, because it could totally fall into being some kind of tribute," Rich says. "But the video has no energy of being a tribute, it has the energy of 'Wow, he's still here.' It shows how timeless he is."
The Jackson/Timberlake version of Love Never Felt So Good has turned into a cross-format radio hit; it's on USA TODAY's adult contemporary, hot adult contemporary, urban adult contemporary and top 40 charts. The song was certified gold this week, with 514,000 downloads sold.
Album Xscape has sold 309,000 copies since its release May 13, according to Nielsen SoundScan, and it returned to the top 10 of the Billboard albums chart this week.