Usher has turned up the heat on the Keke Palmer Las Vegas residency drama by making her the main girl in the video for his new single, “Boyfriend.”
On Tuesday (August 15), the R&B veteran took to Instagram to upload a short teaser for the up-tempo track, which is set to be released in full on Wednesday (August 16).
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In the clip, the Nope star appears with a full beat face and blue and black hair, looking ready to seize her moment. Usher, meanwhile, sings: “Somebody say that your boyfriend’s looking for me.”
After the snippet was posted, fans flocked to the comments section to share their hilarious reactions to Usher and Keke flipping their Sin City saga into a seemingly messy music video.
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One person echoed lyrics from Usher’s 2001 cult-classic track, “U Don’t Have to Call,” by writing: “Don’t leave your girl around me, true playa for real… [goat, crying laughing face emoji],” while someone else said: “This is MENACE BEHAVIOR [crying laughing face emojis].”
Another user suggested that Keke Palmer’s boyfriend, Darius Jackson, “is somewhere punching the air” while calling the video “impeccable marketing.”
Keke Palmer had a night to remember at Usher’s Las Vegas residency in July where she was serenaded by the Confessions crooner with a performance of “There Goes My Baby.”
The steamy clip showed Keke wearing a see-through black lace dress and undergarment as she hugged and danced next to Usher, who had ventured into the audience to woo the actress.
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As the footage quickly went viral on social media, Darius Jackson took to Twitter to share his not-so-impressed reaction to his girlfriend’s wardrobe choice.
“It’s the outfit tho.. you a mom,” he tweeted, before adding: “We live in a generation where a man of the family doesn’t want the wife & mother to his kids to showcase booty cheeks to please others & he gets told how much of a hater he is.
“This is my family & my representation. I have standards & morals to what I believe. I rest my case.”
Just a few days later, Jackson removed all of the photos of himself and Palmer together from his Instagram page, while the couple also unfollowed each other.
In early August, Usher finally addressed the Keke Palmer and Darius Jackson relationship fiasco, dismissing the notion that his serenading was “negative.”
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“I think everybody’s vision or a version of what they felt happened there just leads you back to just really having a good time in Las Vegas,” he told PEOPLE. “And that’s what I hope came out of it. Rather, it was a conversation of what was going on with us having fun in front of the audience or conversation about that song.”
He continued: “Every night I’m thinking about how the world now is going to react to this moment that I’ll have with whoever I’m choosing to sing to. But it was a pop moment, and it was fun to have at least conversation going and we just keep it light. I don’t see anything negative happening in Las Vegas.”
