Big Sean has had a big month. The Detroit-bred rapper born Sean Anderson kicked off June with a visit to his hometown, where he unveiled a new recording studio at his alma mater of Cass Technical High School. This 784-square-foot space will become a part of the school’s music curriculum and is a joint donation from Adidas Originals and the Sean Anderson Foundation, which works to serve disadvantaged youth in the city. On the other end of the spectrum, Big Sean performed a crowd-pleasing medley of hits from his latest album, Dark Sky Paradise, at the BET Awards Sunday night, and after the show he premiered the video for “Play No Games,” marking the fourth clip he’s released in June.
The visual accompaniment for “Play No Games” is an homage to the now-classic ’90s sitcom Martin, and it even features cameos from the show’s stars, including Thomas Mikal Ford, Carl Anthony Payne II, and the title character himself, Martin Lawrence. The song’s guest spots — Chris Brown and Ty Dolla $ign — also get in on the fun (as does French Montana), and redeem one of Dark Sky Paradise‘s weaker numbers with a loving ode to a television favorite. The period details are spot-on, and the humor is pitch-perfect. Mike Carson has directed one of the contenders for video of the year, and you can watch it below.
The first clip that we got from Big Sean this month was “One Man Can Change the World,” whose release was unknowingly timed the day after the deadly shooting of nine African Americans in a historic church in Charleston. Chillingly, the black-and-white video — directed by Andrew Hines and Jeff Powers — takes on gun violence and the toll it affects on the community, as well as the role that police brutality plays in furthering oppression. Watch it below:
In contrast, the Lawrence Lamont-directed video for “I Know,” which features the siren song of Jhene Aiko as a guest spot, is a romantic fantasy that portrays the two artists as aged lovers in a senior citizen home. They escape the dreary world of a prearranged dance and carve out a magic space for just the two of them. Likewise, “All Your Fault” takes place in the contemporary dance factory of the club, where Big Sean dukes it out in a rap battle with his mentor Kanye West, and directors Mark Mayer and Aaron Platt bathe the two MCs in surreal effects that blur the line between fact and fiction. One thing is for certain, though; Big Sean has arrived. Watch the last two videos below: