Sometimes it takes a couple of animated stick figures to make us realize that some songs just don’t make any sense.
“Thrift Shop” is the hit song that shot Macklemore and Ryan Lewis to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 (until Billboard started counting YouTube views, allowing “Harlem Shake” to take the No. 1 spot). Incredibly catchy, it features shot after shot of Macklemore trying on the outrageous outfits that you could only find in your local thrift shop—or, as he claims, your grandparents’ closet.
But anybody singing along probably hasn’t really thought much about what Macklemore’s actually saying until now, thanks to Literal MSPaint.
After over a year of radio silence, the channel that gave us the visual of a rock partying inside a house and an actual shit toupee made a literal music video for “Thrift Shop” in MS Paint.
“A stunning visual exploration of some of today’s finest lyrical poetry,” the video description stated.
Instead of watching Macklemore head toward a DeLorean on a bike held by two women and sing about the clothes he got from the thrift shop, he now has a $20 of change in his pocket, a hissing snake spritzes a perfume called R. Kelly’s Sheets, the thrift shop sells shit, and the words “this” and “awesome” just had sex.
And that’s just within the first minute.
The literal translation of “Thrift Shop” is full of word puns, poop references, and clothes made of living animals, and they’re all drawn as crude shapes and stick figures. You don’t need massive detail to tell what it’s supposed to be—in this case, the lyrics may help with anything you might have misheard—and while it doesn’t make much sense, it makes for a great visual.
“Consider this my application to Pixar,” Literal MSPaint stated in the channel description.
If nothing else, it might be better than the actual music video itself.
Photo via LiteralMSPaint/YouTube
