This past weekend was a pretty big couple days for Donald Glover. Not only did he have the rare opportunity of hosting and performing as the musical guest on the newest episode of “Saturday Night Live,” but he also dropped what is the most talked about music video in a long time. While his appearance on ‘SNL’ was pretty great (makes sense considering he actually auditioned for the show twice), the music video is what you should drop everything and watch.
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The new video for “This is America” has a lot to say. Glover, aka Childish Gambino, begins the video with some fun dancing, with some humorous facial expressions, but after about 45 seconds, that’s when you see the first example of the random acts of gun violence in the video, as he shoots a hooded person in the back of the head. The first time you see the imagery, with a fairly happy-sounding track playing in the background, it’s jarring, to say the least. The foreground singing and dancing is juxtaposed with the actions in the background, showing people seemingly running away from police.
“This is America” is directed by Hiro Murai, who has worked with Glover on a variety of projects. Murai is probably best known to The Playlist audience for directing over a dozen episodes of Glover’s FX series “Atlanta.” He also has other TV work, directing episodes of “Legion” and the new HBO series “Barry.” Outside of his TV work, Murai has spent most of his time directing music videos for artists like Gambino, A Tribe Called Quest, Earl Sweatshirt, and Queens of the Stone Age.
The new song is coming as part of Childish Gambino’s newest (and supposedly final) album, expected to be released later this year. Glover’s last album, “Awaken, My Love!” was a huge hit for the artist. The album was critically-acclaimed and spawned the song “Redbone,” which was famously used in the hit film “Get Out,” by Jordan Peele.
Check out the full video for “This is America” below: