Yesterday I posted Lisa Loeb’s Stay, the first song ever to top the US singles chart by an artist without a record deal. It was a record she held for 19 years.

 

It was matched in 2019 by this tune, Thrift Shop, by Macklemore and Lewis.

 

It’s a hilarious pastiche of macho hip-hop culture and a critique of the product placement prevalent in rap videos filled with brags about brands – flaunting designer labels, fast cars and expensive drinks.

 

Instead of that, Seattle-based rapper Macklemore (Benjamin Heggarty to his mom) and boasts of the bargains he’s picked up in thrift stores – including a 99 cent fur stole – and his preference for wearing “your grandad’s clothes.”

 

“It’s obviously against the status quo of what people normally rap about,” he said. “This is a song that goes against all of that. How much can you save? How fresh can you look by not looking like anybody else?”

 

In other words it’s pure punk: the philosophy with which punk began – second-hand old-man clothes adapted with scribbled slogans and splatters of paint.

 

It’s also very funny – emphasised in Jon Jon Augustavo’s video, shot in several Seattle thrift shops (and the Northwest African American Museum), featuring Macklemore, his producer Ryan Lewis, and guest rapper Wanz.

 

The comedy element went on to have a life of its own, first in a Sesame Street segment, in which “Mucklemore” shows Oscar The Grouch how to recycle his rubbish properly, and an even funnier Passover parody video by Jewish a capella group Six13.