The majority of early Harlem Shake videos adhered to the title format denoting its numeric version (ex: "The Harlem Shake v2"), but the practice soon became redundant and phased out as the volume of uploads continued to grow on YouTube. “You are entitled answers out of your government.” Versioning Pat Brown, the executive editor of Muckrock. “The very basic fact that they’re unwilling to even disclose whether anybody had objections to this internally, or if they were all aboard, is the larger problem,” said J. However, the FCC denied the Freedom of Information Act request. On April 6th, 2018, NBC News reported that the nonprofit organization Muckrock had requested emails pertaining to the creation of the video. I support Net Neutrality like the vast majority of this country and am appalled to be associated with its repeal in anyway." FOIA Request My team and I are currently exploring every single avenue available to get it taken down. I want to be clear that it was used completely without my consent or council. "The use of my song in this video obviously comes as a surprise to me as it was just brought to my attention. That evening, Billboard published a statement from Baauer, in which he claimed to be "exploring every single avenue available to get it taken down." The popularity of the dance reached its peak around 2001, when it was featured or referenced in songs by several New York-based hip hop artists such as Jadakiss, Cam'ron and P. Introduced in 1981 by a Harlem, New York City resident named "Al Bm," the dance was initially referred to as "albee" after his name, but later became known as the Harlem Shake as its prominence grew beyond the neighborhood. The Harlem Shake is a style of dance that involves pivoting the shoulder out while popping the other shoulder out at the same time. On January 30th, 2013, video blogger Filthy Frank uploaded an episode that opens with four people dressed in latex suits dancing to Baauer's "Harlem Shake" (shown below, right). Bauuer's song was met with positive reception from electronica & trap music blogs, as well as other artists including Diplo, Brodinski, and Flosstradamus. The lyric was taken from an incident in member Jayson Musson's life where he got into a fight and finished by getting up and doing the dance. The lyric "do the Harlem Shake" is a sample from the 2001 track " Miller Time" by Philadelphia party rap crew, Plastic Little.
"Harlem Shake" by Baauer, the stage name of American music producer Harry Rodrigues, was uploaded to YouTube on August 23rd, 2012 and released by Diplo's Mad Decent record label, under their sub label Jefferies initially as a free download, along with the B-side "Yaow!".