A video of a mother and her two sons dancing to a jaunty, pirate-ish song has been absolutely everywhere on Twitter. Users of the social media platform have used the jigging family circle to make jokes about everything from health to history to working terrible jobs.
Looking into why anything blows up on the internet is the path to madness, but this video does have an interesting story behind it. Digging for the truth of the video finds that the original soundtrack of the viral clip was completely different and the new version that fueled the meme has been around for years.
The original clip shows the Za'Vier family dancing to the Freco and Merlo song "Drop." It received virality on its own when Aspect Za’Vier uploaded the clip to Vine in 2014. The dance was choreographed by his mother Willona and he performed the dance with her and his brother Dexter. Aspect, who is now a musician performing under the name Aspect Zavi, said he was surprised but happy about the clip bubbling back up.
"I think it's super cool because it's something I just did for fun and everyone's using it as a meme, and that's crazy to me because it was years ago," he said, when reached by Buzzfeed News.
The artist behind the original song "Drop" said that the clip is helping him out as well.
"I actually don't know [why it went viral again now], but it's helping so that's all that matters," Merlo told Buzzfeed.
The new clip sets it to the opening of a One Direction song called "Act My Age" and the updated version has been around since at least 2017.
There's still no telling what kicked the clip back up into the Twitter conversation, but we're glad it's back. Take a look at a few of our favorites below.
