This is Love

Album: willpower (2012)
Charted: 1
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Songfacts®:

  • Will.i.am's second single from his fourth studio album pairs him with vocalist Eva Simons. The Dutch singer first broke through when her song "Silly Boy" hit the singles chart of several European countries. Her 2010 collaboration with AfroJack, "Take Over Control," charted in both the UK and US.
  • Will.i.am produced the dance track alongside Greek-Swedish DJ Steven Angello, who is also a member of the house music group Swedish House Mafia.
  • The song was premiered on Capital FM on May 14, 2012. Will.I.am said of the song's development: "I just finished this song a couple of days ago on my laptop because times have changed. Then we filmed the video two days ago here in London and we edited it on laptops."

    The Black Eyed Peas rapper added: "I've been doing this song since New Year's but taking my time with it, with Steve and Eva, then it's finished on my laptop."
  • Simons told MTV News about her collaboration with will.i.am: "We were in the studio, and he had this track," she recalled. "And he's like, 'Yo, Eva, would you like to do this song with me?' And we had been recording a couple tracks before, so he knows what I'm capable of and he trusts me, and we don't really know each other for that long, but he trusts me.

    I recorded it," she continued. "And he mixes it straight away from his laptop ... and it's done. That's so beautiful — not only is he super creative and knows what he wants, but he also sees when other people are creative as well. He's not afraid to collaborate."
  • Will.i.am recorded the song's "Hell yeah!" refrain during a New Year's Eve show in Las Vegas.
  • Will.i.am told Billboard magazine why he wanted to collaborate with Simons on this song. "Eva Simons is, hands down, the princess of dance music," he said. "She was doing it way before everyone was doing it, and she produces her own self. She picks her own effects. She records herself. We have conversations like, 'So what compressors do you use?' She sings wonderfully, she writes wonderfully, she's sexy. She is the real thing. It's exactly what dance music is about. That's why I'm so happy and honored to be working with her."
  • This was will.i.am's first solo chart-topper in the UK. He said: "I've had Number Ones before with the Black Eyed Peas, but to me this one means so much, because I know people thought I can only be successful in the Black Eyed Peas, they were wrong."

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