Major Lazer and DJ Snake‘s music video for “Lean On” has reached 1 billion plays on YouTube. The video, which features vocalist MØ, was published on March 22nd 2015 and has averaged more than 3,000,000 plays per day.
According to Census.gov, the video has received roughly one play per 7 people on the planet. It’s the 16th YouTube upload to eclipse 1 billion views and ranks first in views among videos published in the last year. To thanks his fans, Diplo published a statement on his Facebook page commenting the big news :
” My first instinct is that we honestly don’t belong up here w Tay Tay, Katy Perry, Justin, Psy and all these other videos in the 1 billion view club. We made this video in India on a limited budget during a couple of off days between tour dates in India, no giant label planned it.. It was literally improvised and made up in a few hours.. Actually like 24 hours. We shot from sunrise to sunrise the next morning, it was so tiring that the dancers & everyone on set were sleeping between the takes. In fact, the choreography was more or less created on site and we all were just trying to learn between takes as well.
We rented this old palace facade, and while it’s looks beautiful on camera, it was just held up by 2x4s and had people sleeping behind every corner or an animal tied to a post. Originally we had plans to use an elephant in the video but after we went over on another shot and it was time to use the elephant, it had fallen asleep! We thought the trainer was just milking us for more money, but alas, the elephant was sound asleep.
I tried to find an atm to get some elephant money out, but the trainer said “no elephant” if I wake him up he will kill everyone. Despite not having an elephant, somehow this video still made it to a billion views and that’s because of you! And just as importantly, we did it independently, the first indie music video to actually hit this accomplishment. We are feeling like the rebel alliance against the death star of pop youtube. One love. ” – Diplo