Bebe Rexha delivered an electric performance of her and David Guetta‘s songs at the 2023 Billboard Music Awards.
Rexha, 34, and Guetta, 56, brought their 2022 hit, “I’m Good (Blue)” — which is nominated for Top Collaboration, Top Billboard Global Song and Top Dance/Electronic Song — and its 2023 follow-up, “One in a Million,” to the Sunday, November 19, awards show. “I’m Good (Blue)” notably spent 55 weeks at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart, making it the second longest-running No. 1 song in the chart’s history after “Happier” by Marshmello and Bastille at 69 weeks.
The performance started out with Rexha surrounded by an orchestra as she sang a slowed down version of “I’m Good (Blue).” As the song transitioned into “One in a Million,” she changed out of her ballgown into dark leggings with a corset top and sparkling boots as she joined dancers on a stage surrounded by fans.
Following the performance, Rexha accepted the award for Top Dance/Electronic Song. “It’s been such an incredible journey … we didn’t think it was going to become such a worldwide anthem. We wanted to just flip a fun song from back in the day, I just can’t believe how far the song has gone,” she gushed while thanking her fans.
Guetta shared his acceptance speech from another location. “Thank you so, so much. This is incredible,” he said. “Bebe, I love you. Thank you for being a part of my life. I think we bring luck to each other. I’m so proud of you. I saw you starting as a songwriter to being a superstar right now.”
Rexha and Guetta wrote “I’m Good (Blue)” in 2017 but initially shelved the track. Years later, she was surprised to hear a bootleg version of the recording on social media. “I was just scrolling on TikTok and I heard a girl singing on a remix of ‘Blue,’” she told Variety in October 2022, referring to Eiffel 65’s 1998 song “Blue (Da Ba Dee)” that inspired her collaboration with Guetta. “I was like, ‘Damn, David and I had an idea to do that back in the day.’”
Rexha only later realized, after sending the video to her social media manager, that she was listening to her own song. “I go to YouTube and it has 30 million views,” she recalled. “I was told it pops up on YouTube every year, goes viral and then gets pulled down.”
When Rexha discovered the unreleased song’s popularity, she rerecorded her vocals and encouraged Guetta to finish producing it so they could drop the official rendition. Upon its release, the track became a chart-topping hit. “It’s incredible,” Guetta said. “It’s refreshing that we are living in a time when really people are choosing what they want to listen to.”
As for the reason behind the song’s success, Rexha pointed to the familiarity of its sound. “People love nostalgia and the ‘00s are back in full force when it comes to fashion and music,” she explained. “I also think people have been cooped up for three years and they just want to be happy and feel good.”
Guetta, meanwhile, believed the answer was less complicated. “Sometimes when you manage to express a simple emotion, people really relate to that,” he noted. “Doing something simple that doesn’t feel cheesy is very difficult. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. But this time it worked better than we could ever imagine.”
