Fences — Arrows (Feat. Macklemore) [Music Video]

Posted by jeffwbaird on August 11, 2014

It’s been almost two years since Macklemore & Ryan Lewis released The Heist to a small group of core fans, and saw their lives transform alongside the newfound stardom. Last December, in the midst of a small touring break, Macklemore penned these two verses for his good friend and collaborator, Fences—whose latest project, Lesser Oceans, comes out October 14th. It’s the writing we’ve gotten from Macklemore since he became a household name, and it serves as an intimate and introspective view into the challenges he’s faced grappling with fame.

Between hip-hop culture’s reactions to Macklemore’s Grammy victories and Drake’s call-out at the ESPY Awards, Mack’s received quite a bit of disdain for the popularity of “Thrift Shop”. In a recent Reddit AMA, he said that he went through a great period of fear when he thought that was all the world would ever know him for. Here he addresses this by saying, “He makes mistakes, tells stories to his paintbrush/And when the world finally sees his art/He wishes that he never would have made it.”

The video is at-once symbolic of this dilemma, as he’s seen climbing a sky-high diving board filled with his Rolling Stone covers, given the choice to make the plunge or back away. Regardless of your thoughts on the artist, this is a powerful and engaging look into the past two years through Macklemore’s eyes, and the latest narrative about the difficulty adjusting to fame.

Tags: Arrows, Fences, Lesser Oceans, Macklemore, Ryan Lewis