Monday, October 15, 2012

Music Video Analysis



Most of the music videos I watch usually do not have very much substance and focus mainly on the benefits of being rich and flaunting it. However, the artist Nas always has very meaningful lyrics and the music video for his song “Daughters” brought the song to life.

The video is mostly shot from the first person view of Nas’s daughter through the many stages of her life. Other pictures also flash during the video that complement the lyrics as they play in the background. The video starts off with his daughter crying when she is born and then she is in a crib as her parents stand over her. They look happy as all parents do when they have a new baby, but Nas, as the father, is the most ecstatic. Next, she is a baby learning how to walk and she is stumbling towards Nas and he smiles as he catches her. The rap begins at this point and his lyrics are basically about the bad stuff that his daughter does and how he thought she was raised to be different. He starts with how mad he was that his daughter was talking to a boy that was in prison, but calms down when he remembers how he never hid how he really was in front of her so he could not blame her. Nas knows that he has been away on stage for most of her life and has not always treated the women in his life with the utmost respect, but that is just how he is. Even though she may want a bad boy, Nas knows how they are and how they because he was one himself, especially of who he is now and how famous he has become. The scene in the back is of her third birthday and it contrasts her innocent nature then to her bad boy crazy ways now as portrayed through his lyrics. His daughter is now 17 and Nas states how he has a problem with her, probably the “awful phase” he mentions at the beginning of the song.  As she continues to do bad things, Nas reflects on how he thought he was being a good dad by being her friend and not too strict on her, but does not understanding what is going through her mind when she does bad things. In the end, his daughter is caught drinking and smoking by the police in a car driven by some bad boys she knows. This is where Nas finally fathers up and sits down to talk to his daughter. He says he is not trying to ruin her life, but she is his daughter and he ultimately only wants the best for her.

I really like this video because it has a good message behind it to all men who have daughters. I myself do not have any kids right now, but I plan to one day. Nas made it really easy to sympathize with his feelings about his daughter through his lyrics and brought the rhymes to life with the video which is why I thought this was a great video.

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