Dizzee Rascal

Dizzee Rascal or Dylan Kwabena Mills is a British rapper and record producer born on the 18th September 1984 and is a pioneer of grime music but he has also incorporated different elements of music like UK garage, baseline, British hip hop and R&B.

Dizzee Rascal released his acclaimed debut album Boy in da Corner in 2003 this is considered as a grime classic and earned him the 2003 Mercury Prize entering the UK top 40 at number 40 and the album would peak at 23. Many music publications praised the album like Planet sound giving this album No.1 album of the year and being one of the top 50 albums of the year.

In September 2004 Dizzee Rascal's second album Showtime did better than his debut album entering the UK Albums chart at 8

dream, Dizzee Rascal

In the dream music video dizzee uses hidden messages to portray middle class uk society as the music video begins with a pastel colour pallet as it shows Dizzee rascal's name is shown on alphabet blocks possibly showing dizzee's transition from grime to pop which he later did change his music to pop. throughout the video he shows his early life and people he use to associate with and those people are portrayed as puppets also the puppets which portrayed black people are sometimes designed with extremely overdramatic features which dizzee made sue they were designed like this to connote to the golliwog caricature which has been a stereotype of black people for over 150 years as black people were portrayed to be entertainers and clowns as they had exaggerated facial expressions similar to clowns and Dizzee wanted to portray they black puppets this way to show how society still use stereotypes and place a whole race in a certain label. The old white woman on the piano is shown as a spectator of everything that happens on her piano and at one point of the music video she is shown shocked and slightly disgusted at the puppet police man and puppet black men  fighting also the policeman and black men are shown having strings attached to them which suggests that Dizzee is portraying them as puppets of the government or society and are being controlled with these labels they are given by society however dizzee is shown normally with having no strings attached to him to maybe connote to him having broken free from the typical labels of a delinquent and never having any power and also breaking any label or class as he has risen  above societies labelings.

the music video takes inspiration from the 1950s uk children's show muffin the mule and this use of intertextuality is to reinforce the mocking of the uk society as golliwogs appear in the music video which the time period that the music video is referencing these racist depictions of black people that were used as toys during   the time period of muffin the mule and the use of golliwogs in the music video reinforces the intertextuality.

The parts of the music video which show Dizzee Rascal usually showing him performing which reinforce his identity as an artist especially the scene which shows him in a studio to show how he is a genuine and original artist.