Giddens, The Expat deposits some thoughtful insight into experiences of marginalisation and alienation, assisted by stunning comic-style visuals in the new video clip for Dreamin’ Big.
It’s no wonder why Giddens, The Expat is quickly becoming a creative force to be reckoned with, demonstrating mastery over quick but complex lyricism as well as a passion for original art styles and eye-catching visuals.
Dreamin’ Big is the immersive audio-visual brainchild of Ghanian born, Berlin-based rapper Giddens, The Expat, and graphic designer/animator Anatol Schulz. It’s a wonderful example of what heights multi-disciplinary creative collaboration can achieve as, the visuals for the song, track beautifully the story that Giddens, The Expat so brilliantly describes.
Dreamin’ Big is the perfect narrative of self-discovery. The journey which Giddens, The Expat reflects upon is depicted by a box headed shadow-figure walking along the path of what seems like an endless desert-scape.
Anatol Schulz flaunts the imaginative extents which drawn animation allows to a capable creator, by transforming the mystical desert-scape into a dreamlike playground for shapeshifting land features. Clever contrasts in size and aspect show a faceless mountain morph into a giant sleeping baby, while the pools of desert-like oasis arise to form giant, human heads against a background of distant pyramids.
All of these figures are representative of the journey of self-discovery as our box-headed protagonist wanders along, observing the world to the sound of Giddens, The Expat’s reflective rap dialogue. Eventual close-ups on the box-headed figure reveal that the box is, in fact, a castle, which continues to morph and develop when fed the visual stimuli of its surreal atmosphere. Eventually, the castle develops into a large-scale, elegant temple that is finally set down in place amongst the otherworldly incarnations of Schulz’s endless imagination.
This ending sequence is a touching salute to Giddens, The Expat’s overarching conceptual ethos that life is a chance to build a temple of knowledge and experience in which to leave to the next generation. Furthermore, materialistic gains are far less a valuable legacy to leave than one of realisation and change.
Watch the new clip above.
