New York, NY (Top40 Charts) The creative collaboration between Swedish artist/producer
Avicii and Volvo Cars for their new brand campaign features a reworking of the classic song
Feeling Good. Filmed on location in Stockholm and Osterlen, southern Sweden, the music video visits places of personal significance for
Avicii and tells his own story of renewal, following several years of hard touring. The music video also features members of his family and close friends.
"In the past six years I have been on a never-ending tour, apart for the last nine months during my time-out. I did around 325 shows in a year with traveling on top of that. It couldn't continue. In the end I had to re-evaluate my situation and change my lifestyle. Sweden is an important place to me, it's where I gather my strength and energy with family and friends. This whole process of re-evaluation and renewal is what Volvo encouraged me to visualise in the music video. I think we did a great job together," said Avicii.
The song
Feeling Good was initially picked as a proposal by Volvo. The arrangement has been produced by Avicii, with Audra Mae on vocals.
"It's great to work with Audra Mae again. She has a powerful and emotionally charged voice and is steeped in the folk and country music traditions. She most recently worked with me on the True album, taking some of her first steps into electronic music with the track Addicted To You. Audra's soulful delivery breathes new life into this classic track. I'm very pleased with the result," said Avicii.
The release of the music video marks another step in Volvo Cars' brand transformation and reflects a new direction for the Swedish luxury car maker.
"We were delighted to have the opportunity to work so closely with
Avicii on this campaign, as it reflects something that is happening for both
Avicii and for the Volvo Cars brand. We are entering a new era - a New Beginning, as we have called the campaign. Volvo Cars have gone through several years of intense investment and we have refined our brand. The result is a new, more nimble and customer-responsive Volvo Cars," said Alain Visser, Senior Vice President Sales, Marketing & Customer Service at Volvo Car Group.
In 2011,
Avicii reached critical mass with the global success of "Le7els," which became a No. 1 dance hit in the U.S. and the U.K. and sold four million tracks worldwide. It topped the charts in six other territories, went top 10 in many more, and garnered Bergling his second Grammy nomination. Other hits, including "
Silhouettes" and "I Could Be the One" (featuring Nicky Romero) followed and 2012 also brought a much-publicized remix of Madonna's "Girl Gone Wild." In 2013,
Avicii won his first American
Music Award (for Favorite Electronic Dance
Music Artist) and his first MTV
Europe Music Award (EMA) (for Best Electronic Artist).
In 2014
Avicii cemented his place in the firmament of superstar recording artist/DJ's with the success of his genre-defying debut album, True, on PRMD Records. The album not only satisfied the 26-year-old Swede's restless creative urge to push musical boundaries, it also upped the ante on what dance music could be by blending the earthy sounds of folk, country, and bluegrass with soaring pop melodies, funky disco jams, and driving house beats. True spawned the 4x-platinum guitar-laden stomper "Wake Me Up," which hit No. 1 in 81 countries and became the most streamed song of all time on Spotify (over 300 million plays) and the No. 1 most Shazamed song worldwide, while racking up 2.6 billion international streams and 600 million combined YouTube views. Upon True's release, The New York Times heralded
Avicii as "an artist carrying today - and tomorrow - on his shoulders."
Last year, he was named World's Best Electronic Dance Artist at the World
Music Awards, and "
Wake Me Up" won Top Dance/Electronic song at the Billboard
Music Awards and EDM Song of the Year at the iHeartRadio
Music Awards. He also enjoyed chart success with True's subsequent singles "
Hey Brother" and "Addicted To You."