Once upon a time, I recapped an insane Christian book that claimed the devil created football as a tool to destroy humanity. The article’s popularity made me turn my recaps into a weekly series named “So You Don’t Have To“, where I find batshit crazy pieces of media (books, movies, etc) and recap them for your pleasure.
The week, I’ll be recapping the music video for Raqie’s “Ati Ready.”
Rasqie was second in the short assembly line of Usher lookalikes/unintentional tribute brands that came out of nowhere in the early 2000s. (The p-square brothers were the first.) Alongside artists like Azadus, The Remedies, and Plantashun Boiz, Rasqie was signed to then juggernaut record label, Kennis Music, and rocked the airwaves with his debut single both named “Soji,” He returned a few years with the song, “Ati Ready.”
“Ati Ready” was (and still is) a bop, but something about the music video has always bothered me. Specifically, how random and chaotic it is. As I do every week in this series, I’m going to deconstruct the video to show you exactly what I mean.
The video starts with one of these:
Which made me freak out because I thought I was having a stroke. The video starts for real with two different shots of a sunset and one shot of the full moon, unintentionally making the video look like a horror vampire film from the 1990s.
It goes from this to a shot of a casino/club so poorly-lit that I first thought it was a sex dungeon.
As the extras dressed in insane early 2000s outfits are gambling, Rasqie walks in, dressed in a tie & dye ensemble and with an enormous guitar perched on his shoulder.
All the people there turn to look at him the moment he enters, probably wondering he has shown up to a club/casino/sex dungeon with a guitar. Even more confusing is that after his entrance, the guitar vanishes and is never shown again. So it’s like, what was even the point?
Anyway, the song starts and all the people in the club proceed to lose their fucking minds.
Movie musical style.
It’s when the camera starts moving around the club that the most interesting things in this video become apparent: The extras. It seems like they were given no direction in regards to dress code so they all showed dressed like they were going for different events.
This lady is serving “Christ Embassy member attending mid-week service” realness with her top and hairstyle:
These girls are twinning in what looks like Las Vegas showgirl costumes:
“Alexa. Play ‘Best Friend’ by Saweetie.”
These girls look like every happening 100 level babe in every old Nollywood movie:
This lady looks like a mother who’s left her kids at home with her husband because she needs a night out on the town.
“You better live your life, sis! YAS!!!“
This guy looks like an intro tech teacher who clearly comes here every Friday night to blow off steam because he hates his job and students.
This guy looks like a 16-year old who somehow made it into the club and is now trying to see if he can convince an older woman to have sex with him in the club’s unisex bathroom.
And then there’s the song’s female vocalist, who came to the club dressed in native, complete with gele.
She has an outfit change later in the video that I can’t take seriously because an early Destiny’s Child Kelly Rowland wig is involved.
The video goes on like this for 4 mins and 56 seconds, with all the people at the club super hyper for no apparent reason. I watch it till the end, knowing that a party like this can only end one way.
RECOMMENDED: I Watched The Nollywood Movie, “Full Moon,” So You Don’t Have To
