7 Music Videos With Small Details You Probably Missed

Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I've always been a lover of music videos. Whether it was The Box, MTV, BET, 106&Park or any other video countdown, I could always find myself glued to a TV watching music videos. Hopefully that context helps in highlighting that it should be no surprise that it's been in my vision to create visuals of my own.

With the release of The Perfectionist last month, I've had small opportunities to highlight some of the inspiration online, but plan to do so as the rollout continues.

The truth is, though, I can spot small details about music videos that I realize a lot of other people probably don't. So, here's a brief list calling out some details about music videos over the years that you may or may not have noticed. The list goes from most obvious to hardest details to spot, so enjoy and let me know what you think.

Are any of these small details familiar to you?

Hov Goes To Carnival

Jay-Z ft. UGK
Big Pimpin'
Directed by Hype Williams

The Big Pimpin' video is easily one of the most iconic videos of the 2000s. You have Hype William's classic opener while Hov, Dame Dash, UGK and a cast of other characters enjoy a cruise vacation in the Caribbean. The video is full of champagne, beautiful women, and maybe a detail that might get overlooked pretty easily.

Hov is in the islands for carnival.

At face value, yeah, it's pretty obvious. But considering the video's release in the 2000s, you almost wonder how places like Cancun and Daytona Beach continued being Spring Break and Summer Vacation dream destinations for young people as opposed to Carnival in Trinidad & Tobago where there literally are dozens of beautiful, dancing women playing mas and in costume.

It's almost surprising that Jay-Z from New York, Bun B and Pimp C from Houston didn't serve as propaganda to make carnival a more widely recognized festivity to Hip-Hop culture sooner - and by sooner, meaning 2001.

I also want to call out that at 1:54, I always thought the young lady behind Bun B was Hillary Bank actress, Karyn Parsons. I thought that when I was younger. I needed glasses that early.

Pursuit of Happiness: A Real Nightmare

Kid Cudi ft. MGMT
Pursuit of Happiness (Nightmare)
Directed by Megaforce

Kid Cudi's fast start to success is captured very well in his Amazon Prime Documentary, A Man Named Scott. A product of the so-called "Blog Era" of Rap, Cudi's success with "Day & Nite" came almost completely from success on Myspace Music and then his follow-up work with Kanye West, who signed him on to write on 808s & Heartbreaks. But it's not off the wall to say that both Cudi's sound and vision were so unique, it didn't really have a solid place both on the G.O.O.D. Music Label roster and in the industry.

When Man on the Moon: End of Days released in 2009, Cudi was on the label with the likes of Common, John Legend, Consequence, Q-Tip, and Mos Def. The following year, Kanye would recruit Pusha T, Big Sean, and try his luck at pulling Lloyd Bank's from 50 Cent's G-Unit Label. With such a completely different approach, it shouldn't be a surprise that there are two videos for Pursuit of Happiness.

The first features more of a club vibe, with cameos by Consequence, Tre Songs, and Drake. It looks and feels like what a music video for a party jam or a "club hit" would look like in 2009. But Cudi's second video for the song, directed by MegaForce is completely different.

For one, the video features band members of MGMT and has a feel that would remind you of an actual nightmare (as the song is also called). It has a feel like Happy Death Day, Happy Gilmore and the "weirdo" feel that matches Ratatat'sound, which all have become synonymous with Cudi's style over the last 15yrs as opposed to a more cookie-cutter presentation that the label would have preferred.

Which video do you like better?

"Project Chick" In the Old Projects of Miami

Cash Money Millionaires
Project Chick
Directed by Troy Smith

Watching Juvenile's recent Tiny Desk Concert was both nostalgic and refreshing. It's refreshing for so many people to see Juvie getting his flowers on such a public forum, and for his work to be recognized as a staple during Black Music Month. The entirety of Cash Money Records - from Lil Wayne, Turk, BG, The Big Tymers, and yes, even Paparoo - embodied what it meant to be "hood rich". The idea of coming up from projects and the hood to reaches levels of success is something that I immediately point to Cash Money for. In that mix of storytelling and reflection, obviously was Juvenile.

But one of this less reflective song from the 2000 Soundtrack for the label's movie Baller Blockin', "Project Chick", has an interesting piece to it.

At first glance, it may look like the crew pulled up to just another project, but that project happens to be the old Sabal Palms Projects in Miami's Lil Haiti/Lemon City area. Not too far from the Art District and the popping scenes of Wynwood, Sabal Palm sits just West of Biscayne Blvd on 54th Street in Miami, and shut down to be renovated (or gentrified) as The Design Place (or The D Place).

In the Miami of the past, the idea was that if you had no business somewhere, you just never went. Sabal Palm was unfortunately notorious for being a problematic place, rumored with crime, gang activity, and poverty, so outside of knowing the neighborhood because it hugged my brothers' high school, I had actually never seen what the insides of the neighborhood looked like until the video released in 2002.

Choosing the location in itself likely doesn't have any other significance, but knowing that the hood rich Cash Money Millionaires went on some sort of a Project World Tour and were able to shoot a video of that caliber in that location says a lot about their notoriety and the popularity of their music.

John Legend Meets Bae On "Stereo" Set

John Legend
Stereo
Directed by Neon

Long before his music was playing at weddings across America, John Legend was a sponge-brushed, light-skin, spoken word, Allen Lipschitz-level R&B toxic - and it made for great music on his debut and sophomore album. With songs like, "Again", "Another Again", and "Stereo" his 2005 album, Once Again (this man said "again" at least 100x on this album) was filled with bops about rough romance, trying to figure it out, and calling out toxicity in spaces that should have love, peace, and harmony.

With "Stereo" being an R&B jam about video vixens and groupies, there's irony in the fact that the model who was casted as the video vixen would end up being none other than Chrissy Teigen.

The story almost mirrors that of then-label mate, Kanye West, meeting Kim Kardashian on the set of Brandy's music video. In her casting and their moving and grooving, the two ended up enjoying their music video chemistry, which gave way to some sparks and their eventual dating that would lead to their engagement, marriage, then having kids, and becoming one of Hollywood's more favored public couples.

All from this one video, eh?

Daft Punk's Anime Is A Full Blown Movie

We probably all recognize Daft Punk's music video for "One More Time" from their 2001 album, Discovery. It was one of those videos that played on MTV or VH1 back in the day and just seemed to be such a feel good song, with great visuals. It features a group of blue-skinned musicians playing at a concert, and at first, you assume this is just part of the video. One could easily be Black, considering his afro, and the others could be any race or ethnicity, too. By the end of the video, you see a group storm the concert and make a break away with the group in tow in what is likely a kidnapping.

But did you know that the entire album itself is invested in this anime storytline?

Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem is the 2003 film by Daft Punk that drops a storytline to each one of the Discovery album's 14 songs. Starting with "One More Time", the movie is about a group of alien musicians who are abducted from their home planet, brought to Earth, and used as pawns within the music industry to push record sales.

Had it not been for the release of the "Harder, Better, Faster" video sometime later, I likely would not have seen the continuity of characters from the original release. The movie has influences beyond just Daft Punk, though. Again, we call back to Kanye West and the "Stronger" video, which has light references to the scenes from the Daft Punk original, incluing Anime-like visuals and machinery that resembles what was used to abduct the aliens in Interstella 5555.

Politics & Culture In "Bad Girls"

M.I.A.
Bad Girls
Directed by Romain Garvas

Hear me out. MIA's Bad Girls video is one of the greatest videos of all time.

In an era where music videos were beginning to become obsolete with the growth of platforms like YouTube and Vimeo, labels didn't care to dedicate too much money for music videos to advance songs because tours were proving to be more profitable and the likes of cable music video countdowns were kind of falling off.

But in came MIA, with her controversy, her revolutionary take, and her rebounding off the success and impact of "Paperplanes". The Bad Girls video has significance because, sure, it's got crazy car stunting, drag racing, and visuals, but considering the title of the song, it was political push that featured some themes and commentary that were extremely controversial for the times, specifically in Saudi Arabia.

It's 2012, and MIA's got women driving cars.

One particular journo writing for Guernica called out MIA's video at the time as "pandering to Western stereotypes of Arab countries", but I always looked at the video as creating visibility to somethat that seems so everyday to Americans, yet wasn't yet a right for women in Arab countries. There's a lot of complications in the long history of the right to drive in Saudi Arabia, but one thing I always call out is how dope this video is and the fact that it made me aware of the cause and fight behind the controversy.

Omegas in Drama's "Left, Right, Left"

A-T-L-A-N-T-A-G-A WHERE I S-T-A-Y

Yeah. There's a lot of spelling in Drama's "Left, Right, Left", and it's likely why it's so easy to miss that his male extras in the background of the entire video are members of Omega Psi Phi.

From hops, stomps, and even a hook thrown (2:42), you might look at the whole video as a step show opener video or promo for a travelling step team from here on out. With the camouflage and boots all throughout the video, The Ques do fit right in and, considering this video released when I wasn't in college (and not very familiar with NPHC fraternities), it's easy to have completely missed this detail over the last 20 years, but I guarantee it's hard to miss once you see it.

Did I miss any callouts?

What do you think about these music video details, and are there any others that you've picked up on over the years. Feel free to comment below, or keep the conversation going via Threads.