David Guetta Remixed Martin Luther King’s ‘I Have A Dream’ Speech Into Club Music In A Hilariously Tone Deaf Move

Who among us hasn’t enjoyed the discography of David Guetta at some point? I know plenty of my gym playlists have been littered with David Guetta’s beat drops paired with various female vocalists over the years. But even with Guetta’s popularity that’s previously driven over $1,000,000 in fundraising during his multiple “United At Home” specials, there’s a time and a place for everything. And David Guetta’s certainly well-intentioned club mix of Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech may have missed that time and place:

it's lazy and easy to joke that something feels like it was scripted by Sacha Baron Cohen but also pic.twitter.com/7hFkUbNIsn

— Sean Craig (@sdbcraig) May 31, 2020

Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Martin Luther King had a lot of great speeches and points every time he spoke. But it never truly resonated to me until it sounded like he gave those talks in front of a room of sweaty drugged up people wearing neon.” And that’s a perfectly fair point. But Guetta has been skewered for the move:

I fully admit that I laughed pretty hard when I first saw this video of David Guetta’s Martin Luther King “I Have A Dream” remix. It is VERY silly to think that you should put one of history’s most important men and speeches over club music.

At the same time, you have to look at the intent. David Guetta isn’t American. He likely can’t fully relate to what black people feel during these trying times. But here he is, honoring one of our greatest Americans in his own language, the language of beat drops. DJs largely take others’ work and make it their own in a way that gives it new life. And whether he succeeded or failed with this Martin Luther King remix, the intent is clearly there. He wants to be a part of peace, he wants to raise money and he wants to acknowledge the contributions of black people. There’s almost a childlike naivete to how he went about it, certainly. But I’d rather see David Guetta try to bring light to what’s going on in the best way he can than see him not try at all.

Here’s hoping David Guetta doesn’t find the collected works of Malcolm X for his next “United At Home” show but I still won’t begrudge the dude for trying. All we can do is attempt to try and be an ally in this time of need for our friends and peers. David Guetta gets an A for effort in my book.