Watch ‘Immigrants’ Featuring K’naan, Residente, Riz MC & Snow Tha Product
Co-executive produced by Questlove and Black Thought, ‘The Hamilton mixtape’ has been doing the rounds since the end of last year, but now gets its first official video for the track ‘Immigrants’ (We Get The Job Done).
A cinematically charged piece of unbridled emotion, the visual opens with a voice talking on the current state of affairs –“its really astonishing that in a country founded by immigrants, “immigrant” has somehow become a bad word”. Directed by Tomás Whitmore and executive produced by Robert Rodriguez and Lin-Manuel Miranda, the video is literally a living testament to these very strange times of ours, leaving you asking the question – ‘how the fuck did we even get here in 2017?’.
As each MC goes back to back, their verses are shot in different scenarios cutting from a makeshift sweat shop to a meat abattoir, inside a subway train, to the top of a freight train. Lyrically and visually, ‘Immigrants’ features Somali-Canadian K’Naan, alongside Mexican/American Snow Tha Product, British Pakistani Riz MC and Residente whose parents emigrated from Puerto Rico.
Immigrants, we get the job done / Look how far I come
Ramrodded with stories constantly demonising immigrants for failed domestic policies, we watch on as the US unleashes a domestic attack on immigrants with a travel ban and ICE raids. While the UK pursues isolationist policies post-Breixt supported by a right wing press that plasters ugly headlines on its front pages.
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Award-winning Broadway musical ‘Hamilton’ opens in London in November, till then the mixtape serves as an inspired interpolation featuring Sia, Usher, The Roots, Alicia Keys, Nas, Wiz Khalifa, Chance the Rapper, John Legend and many more artists.
The ‘Immigrants (We Get The Job Done)’ video has been launched in conjunction with an exclusive sweepstake presented in association with Prizeo.com. The proceeds will be benefiting the “Immigrants: We Get The Job Done Coalition”, an alliance of immigration-focused non-profits throughout the US assembled by The Hispanic Federation.
