One Direction’s global hit “Drag Me Down” now has an official video. And it’s out of this world. Really.
In the big-budget clip, shot at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, the British and Irish pop stars get put through their paces like astronauts prepping for a space mission. Millions of One Directioners would argue the boys are made of the “right stuff,” and the promo sets out to prove it.
The lads get to test out NASA T-38 aircraft jets that astronauts typically use for training, and they mess about in the NASA WB-57 high-altitude research aircraft — a specialized aircraft used for high atmosphere-research work. Liam Payne gets inside the International Space Station replica, Louis Tomlinson gets behind the wheel of the Space Exploration Vehicle rover, Niall Horan has a ride on the Partial Gravity Simulator, and Harry Styles catches up with Robonaut, a humanlike robot. They’re essentially acting out every boy’s dream.
The band’s new clip was shot in Houston, with long-term collaborators Ben and Gabe Turner from Fulwell 73 in the “director” chairs.
Since “Drag Me Down” dropped without fanfare on July 31, the single has hit No.1 on iTunes in 90 countries, according to Sony Music, and has more than 40 million streams to date on Spotify. Written by Jamie Scott, John Ryan and Julian Bunetta and produced by Ryan and Bunetta, the song set a pair of records on the streaming service (highest first-day streams for a single globally and highest first-week streams for a single ever in the U.K.). The track reached No. 1 on the U.K. and Australian sales charts and No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100.
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“Drag Me Down” is lifted from the group’s forthcoming fifth album, which is due for release this November.
Watch the boys blast off in the clip below.
This story first appeared on Billboard.com.
