Katrina Rees
John Legend has released a powerful video for his latest single ‘Penthouse Floor’ which features Chance the Rapper.
The visual sees Legend, real name John Stephens, play a hotel’s ’employee of the month’. During his shift at work, there’s a Black Lives Matter protest, and John sets out to attempt to create unity in a divided United States. The artistic visual highlights the country’s current state both politically and socially, something of which John has always spoken out about.
Speaking of the video to Complex, who premiered the visual, John said: “With the chorus of going to the penthouse floor, we were thinking about upward mobility, and thinking about escape. The more I sat with the song as I was making the record, I wanted to have more attention in the song where I was thinking about not just upward mobility and escaping, but also thinking about what it means to come from humble beginnings like I come from, a blue collar family, where people that are often ignored and forgotten about, and to elevate to more rarified air like I am now but to not forget about where you come from.”
“And to use your power and status to uplift people and shine a light on places where we come from. That is what the song lyrically evolved to and that is what the video represents.”
Check out the video for ‘Penthouse Floor’ featuring Chance the Rapper below.
‘Penthouse Floor’ is the third single taken from John’s most recent album, Darkness and Light. It follows on from ‘Love Me Now’, which has been streamed over 200 million times, and the MTV VMA winning ‘Surefire’.
John is about to wrap up the European leg of his Darkness and Light World Tour. He will perform in Portugal today (October 14), before heading to South Africa next month for a series of shows.
