Macklemore And Hip Hop Legends Come Together In the Strange And Hilarious ‘Downtown’ Video

At first, this looks familiar. A little bit 70s retro with break dancing. The scene is urban. Wait, is this “Uptown Funk”? It is not unlike the Bruno Mars song you hear in every department store, and you may feel that this is some kind of response to “Uptown Funk.” Downtown vs. Uptown – but on different sides of the continent? Macklemore is certainly shooting for the same theme, and he pulls it off in the most odd and delightful way.

Despite the striking similarities between these two in the beginning of the video, as the music picks up and the scenes progress we find something entirely different in a series of harmonies and change-ups that only seem to grow in drama.

Macklemore just wants “gas in the tank, and cash in the bank,” so he heads down to the moped store. All so he can get downtown. Hip-hop pioneers Grandmaster Caz, Kool Moe Dee and Melle Mel share his passion for Downtown and riding through alleys to get there. They feature in the song along with other artists such as Foxy Shazam vocalist, Eric Nally.

Nally enters the video riding a chariot pulled by a team of riderless Harley-Davidson motorcycles while belting out a chorus that brings elements of Queen into the mix. It’s ridiculous in the best kind of way. Nally and Macklemore dance through the streets with their respective crews before converging in an intersection that Rolling Stone believes to be Spokane.

The video cuts back to Macklemore as he rides on the shoulders of another moped rider, which begs the question: he just dropped $800 on a new moped, why does he need to hitch a ride? The only advice I can give is not to question these things. “Downtown” is a modern masterpiece of awkward mustaches, two-wheeled machines, and classic hip hop.

Well done.