Maroon 5’s “Memories” Joins YouTube’s Billion Views Club, and “Sugar” Gets Rare Airplay
Maroon 5 celebrated two major milestones this week as two of the Adam Levine-led group’s music videos surpassed major YouTube viewership milestones. First up, the band’s video for the wistful single “Memories” from their album. Geordie The album reached one billion views.
The 2019 song about lost friends, inspired by the death of the band’s longtime manager Jordan Feldstein, peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. The backup video, directed by David Dobkin, features a close-up of a bearded, scythe-beaked Levine. against a black backdrop, the wistful chorus sings: “This is the one we have/Welcome wishing you were here but you’re not/Cause dreams bring back all the memories of everything we’ve been through.”
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The camera slowly pulls back to reveal Levine’s head and shoulders as the light wavers around him, eventually leaving the singer in darkness and ending with the line “For Geordie.”
Additionally, the video for their 2014 single “Sugar” reached an even higher peak this week, surpassing four billion views on YouTube. The song is from the pop group’s fifth album. IN — written by Levine with Mike Posner, Dr. Luke, Jacob Hindlin and Henry Walter — also peaked at number two on the Hot 100.
Playful Wedding CrashersThe Dobkin-inspired video was filmed in Los Angeles and featured the band apparently crashing a series of weddings in one day, driving around in a vintage convertible and confusing bridges and grooms as they show up with their equipment to perform impromptu reception gigs to the delight of the assembled friends and families. The five-minute clip ends with Levine saying, “This is the coolest thing ever, ever,” while high-fiving and hugging the happy couple.
“Sugar” is the group’s first video to reach four billion views, surpassing their 2018 single “Girls Like You” (3.5 billion), another video for “One More Night” with a billion views, and several videos with 800 million views. -plus views (“Animals”, “Payphone”, “Moves like Jagger”).
M5 have been in low-power mode since headlining the Super Bowl LIII halftime show in Atlanta in 2019, releasing one-off singles “Memories”, “Nobody’s Love” (2020), “Beautiful Mistakes” featuring Megan the Stallion . (2021) and last year’s “Middle Ground” while opening a Las Vegas residency at Park MGM in March 2023. Although they have hinted at new music in subsequent years, M5 have not released a full-length album since 2021. Geordie.
Their M5LV The Residency at the Dolby Live at Park MGM continues this summer/fall, with 16 shows scheduled in May, June, September and October.
Watch the videos for “Memories” and “Sugar” below.
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