Of course I’ve seen “This is America.” I’ve seen it, like 50 times now. I don’t watch music videos, either. And I *checks clips* have never written about a music video. But “This is America” isn’t really a music video. It’s more like a book, so here we go. Let’s start with the chapter I’m reading now — Chapter 4: The Artist.
I’m watching the young, handsome brother who is clad in light-colored shirt and slacks and flip-flops. He’s approaching the chair with the guitar and in the background, the music begins: “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, go away.” He begins strumming the guitar.
By the time Donald Glover aka Childish Gambino is done slinking over behind him, making mocking minstrel faces that almost have to be in the guitarist’s direction, the guitarist is gone. At least he’s not who he was just a moment ago. He’s bound, head covered in a sack, pants bloodied, dirty. His guitar is gone.
And then he is shot and dragged away.
We’ll take the music, we’ll take your talent. You?
Go away.
This is a really interesting chapter, as it intersects with another piece released this week by Ta-Nehisi Coates. It’s called “I’m Not Black, I’m Kanye.” You should read it. In it, Coates strips West bare, but in the way that only he can, he showcases West, Michael Jackson and himself in portraits of the artists as young men. He looks at the moments when they all struggled with fame and how it affected their sanity. Jackson, it seems, lost, having scrubbed his face to try to reach that standard of beauty he knew. West, it seems, is struggling mightily now, with his concept of “free thinking” which apparently involves the reimagining of history. And then there was Coates, whose success pulled him into new circles and new power and new critics, who made him doubt himself. It changed him, and he thought for a moment there that he had lost his mind, to the point where he questioned his own ability and talent. Who is he? It’s a question he’s still asking. And that must be how it started for Jackson, for West, when their gifts catapulted them into levels of stardom that changed them. They probably struggled to hold on to who they are, as Coates is now. For West, who once rapped: “Racism’s still alive, they just concealin’ it,” now calls Donald Trump “my boy” — a “boy” who tried to ban Muslims from this country using the law. Notably, though, West didn’t even know about this, according to Coates, until another rapper informs him.
The guitarist makes a return in Glover’s video, near the end. He’s back in the chair, with his guitar, no longer bound and free to play, but his head is still covered. He looks to be playing enthusiastically as Glover dances all over the hood of an abandoned car and a singer whose name is apparently Sza (I told y’all I don’t do music videos) watches, as most sisters are supposed to do in music videos, right? She must also notice all the empty and open cars whose warning lights are going off. But the artist. He gets to keep his talent, but he can’t see what’s happening around him. He can’t sing what he can’t see. Which is by design — now the chant in the background is “Black man, black man, get your money, get your money.”
Money’s easy to get. Keeping your identity and your gifts intact, this chapter, and Coates, seem to be saying, is much harder, and so much more precious.