Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am debuted his new music video celebrating President-elect Obama’s victory on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” Friday.
The lyrics of “It’s a New Day” include: “I woke up this morning, feeling brand new/Cuz the dreams that I’ve been dreaming has finally come true.”
While the Grammy-winning artist performed the song at the Chicago studio, a video featuring photos of Obama, his family, Winfrey and the Rev. Jesse Jackson from Chicago’s Election Night rally played on a giant screen behind him. The video also shows black and white photographs of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Harriet Tubman.
Winfrey asked the artist, who attended the Chicago rally, to describe how he felt when Obama walked on stage.
“I can’t really explain it in words,” he said. “I thought of all the people that paved the way for that moment.”
Earlier this year, will.i.am created a buzz for Obama when he made a “Yes We Can” music video with celebrities including John Legend and Scarlett Johansson reciting parts of an Obama speech set to music. The video received millions of online views.
Other guests Friday were ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos and Sam Perry, called “Mr. Man” by Winfrey and dubbed by some as “Oprah’s human hanky.”
Perry, an Obama campaign worker from California and a Silicon Valley businessman, gained instant fame after camera shots of a teary Winfrey leaning over his shoulder at the Chicago rally circulated widely.
Winfrey described the densely packed crowd and said she was so swept up in the historic moment that she didn’t even know who Perry was at the time.
“I never even saw his full face. I only saw him from the side,” Winfrey said. “So if I had to identify him from a lineup, I couldn’t.”
Winfrey thanked Perry and apologized for not asking his name at the rally.
He was not bothered.
“You were so kind to express concern over my jacket. But this is the jacket,” Perry said pointing to the brown blazer he was wearing. “And you’ll see there is no mascara.”
Perry said he received numerous phone calls and messages about his moment with one of the world’s most famous women.
“It’s very good, actually, that the cameras where there,” he said. “Because it was a lot easier to go home to my wife and say ‘It really was Oprah.”’