Chaka Khan – Like Sugar
2018 · Directed by Kim Gehrig
660K Likes
Best comments
1.“The editor: 'I'm almost done editing. I'm almost done editing. I'm almost done editing. I'm done editing. I'm almost done editing. I'm almost done editing.'”
More comments
- 2.“I foresee this song being in the next mainstream commercial for an electronic device.”
- 3.“This is the sickest Apple product ad yet.”
The story
Chaka Khan hadn't released a record since Funk This in 2007. Then in June 2018 the Queen of Funk came back with Like Sugar, the first single on Diary Records, a new label run by producer Switch, a founder of Major Lazer. It started as a limited Record Store Day release, turned into one of the summer's big club tracks with DJs like Mark Ronson and The Black Madonna playing it, and set off a #LikeSugarChallenge. It later landed on her 2019 album Hello Happiness.
Director Kim Gehrig, who usually makes ads for brands like Ikea and Cadbury, asked a simple question: what would Soul Train look like if it were made today? She shot her answer in one day at an old petrol station in White City, London. Three days later the building was demolished. Dancers in vintage clothes repeat their moves in loops cut right in camera, like a GIF stuck on repeat, and more and more of them pile in until the frame turns into a glitchy, colorful riot. The Paris choreography duo I Could Never Be A Dancer set the moves, and Framestore handled the color and effects.
The video won two UK Music Video Awards. One move, again and again, until everybody's dancing. Simple. Deceptively simple.
