Story behind Young Blood Neet’s viral ‘ILY’ ft. influencers Tito Abdul, Tito Marsy

Hip hop artist Young Blood Neet (center) with TikTok duo Tito Abdul and Tito Marsy | Image: INQUIRER.net/Jessica Ann Evangelista

Hip-hop artist Young Blood Neet (YB) recently opened up about the unexpected success of his track, “ILY,” which took off after TikTok duo Tito Abdul and Tito Marsy created an online challenge out of it that inspired recreations from celebrities Joshua Garcia, David Licauco, and Dennis Trillo, among others, who brought even more attention to the trend.

In an interview with select members of the press on Tuesday, Nov. 12, YB and the influencers met each other for the first time and reflected on the audience perception that they received from the “ILY” track, which now has 59 million streams on Spotify.

The dance challenge involves doing “pacute” and “pagirly” poses in the tune of the song.

“Hindi siya planado. Ang branding ko kasi pasweet. So ang ginawa ko nilandian ko lang siya. Kala ko nga nung una magagalit siya kasi ginanon ganon ko na sweet. So di ko in-expect na kinabukasan magviviral,” said Marsy.

(It is not planned. My branding is sweet. So I just flirted with the song. At first I thought he would get angry because I was so sweet. But I didn’t expect that the video would go viral the next day.)

His sentiments were echoed by YB, who shared that he didn’t put much thought into writing the now viral song.

“Yung song na ‘yun, kapag pakikinggan niyo, ‘yung ibang music ko, sobrang layo nun. Complex kasi ang music ko. ‘Yung song na ‘yun, sobrang simple lang. Kung ano pa ‘yung hindi mo pinaghandaan o pinagplanuhan, ‘yun pa ang pumutok,” he said, adding that he got aware that the song went viral after he watched the dance challenge.

(That song, when you listen to it, my other music, is too different. Because my music is complex. That song is so simple. But I guess the thing is whenever you didn’t prepare or plan for anything, that’s when it will surprise you.)

“Nakakatuwa kasi hindi naman ako nag-ano na ‘Yo, baka pwede niyo gawan ng TikTok,’ So ginawa nila ng genuine. Masaya ako doon. Tapos nag hit pa siya. Thank you, Lord,” added the hip-hop singer.

(It’s funny because I didn’t say ‘Yo, maybe you can make TikTok out of this,’ So they made something genuine. I’m happy because it’s a hit.)

YB, who shared that his experience with theater contributed to his musical endeavors, has recently released a new single titled “Good Girl.”

Meanwhile, Marsy and Adbul, who recently left their advertising jobs to pursue content creation full time, weighed in on the role of influencers to create a viral moment out of something.

“Nakakapressure rin siya. Ang ginagawa na lang namin. Kung paano nagviral ‘yung una, hindi kami humihiwalay sa ganong strategy,” said Marsy.

(It is also a lot of pressure. So what we try to do whenever one video goes viral, we are not breaking away from that strategy.)

“Ang mindset ko is hindi ako nag-uupload para kumita or sumikat,” Adbul added. “Bonus na lang sakin kapag nag-viral. Nakakapressure somehow, hindi naman maiiwasan.”

(My mindset is that I don’t upload to make money or become famous. It’s just a bonus for me when it goes viral. The pressure, somehow, of course, is unavoidable.)

The TikTok duo plans to stay in the line of content creation while also pursuing independent projects in acting.