A new music video of a new single from Donald Glover (aka Childish Gambino) dropped this past Sunday. Coinciding with his appearance on Saturday Night Live, 'This is America' was uploaded to his YouTube channel and, brother, this isn't a song about patriotism.
Directed by Hiro Murai, a constant collaborator with Glover, the video starts out upbeat before it takes a turn for the unexpected within the first minute. This is a definite earworm that's impaled on the visual tenterhooks already embedded into your eyes, where over the course of a seeming continuous long shot, Childish Gambino traipses through a visceral field of discharged firearms, a background riot, and choreographed gwara gwara dancing while reminding us that 'This is America'.
In previous interviews, Glover stated that his next album after the Grammy-winning Awaken, My Love!, will be his last under the Childish Gambino moniker. If this fulminant single, a commentary on the current state of affairs is anything to go by, it is the perfect salvo to Childish Gambino's swan song.
