




“I’ve been travelling on this road too long. Just trying to find my way back home. But the old me’s dead and gone.” This is the chorus of a very popular R&B song in the late 2000’s about how TI is trying to get rid of his older self and becoming a new person do his past filled with crime and other moments he would like to put behind him. During the music video, the first section of the rap portrays how TI views his past and how to get them in his past in order to live his life in a way he would rather live. By looking at the visuals that TI provides in the first section of the rap, we can tell that he is showing how tough it is to move on from his past when it is all that he has known. This is important because it allows us viewers and listeners to get a different feel rather than just what he is saying in the song and to get a grander effect on the situation that he and so many others are dealing with. 

During the first rap in the song, which goes from 0:48:1:45, the camera switches between TI rapping, a dark car going down an almost abandoned road and a group of guys that look to be on the streets not doing anything constructive to society and causing mishap which is then followed by shots of a hospital and an x-ray. All of these shots are meshed together in a very unorthodox way as it is not a very smooth transition between these shots with the camera not allowing the images to flow together. After the poor transitions however, the camera goes back to being of the same quality as previously. The way that this is an effective use of camera by the director is it relays the message of the song in another way rather than just having the lyrics and have the listeners interpret what the song represents. TI in this song tries to get the message that the transition from going back to the old way that you lived and trying to start a new life will not be a one-step plan and it will take a lot of work and decisiveness to stay on track and not to fall into bad habits. This type of visual could be deemed to be directed at members of society that at one point were stuck or are stuck in a similar state of being that TI was stuck in. Alone and helpless while trying to move on from a tough situation that is all that you have known is not easy. The switch from the past t0 present will take some hard doing but will be worth it once the process is finished. moving on from these events will be very helpful as you move into a new lifestyle as TI proposes through his lyrics and his use of poor transitions in the first rap section of the song

Along with the choppy transitions, TI utilizes very blurry and dark camera affects to show how that is how he views his past and what he wants to get away from. Whether it be him and Justin Timberlake in a desert, flashbacks to previous moments in his life or TI driving down an abandoned road, the camera does not have lighting and clarity that would appear if it were in a natural situation. This could be the director symbolizing how TI views his and other people in similar situations to his past. Not very happy times as their life was spiraling out of control filled with times they do not remember or are trying to forget, the director does a great job of instilling the blurry moments especially in the flashbacks in which it is especially apparent that they are trying to get the point across of how these times are not what should be strived for. Along with trying to appeal to the people that are in the situation that he is trying to climb out of, I think that TI is also trying to persuade others not to fall into the situation where he is if they have the ability not too. The images that are shown in particular during the flashbacks are used to show how miserable this time was for him. Not only does the blur and darkness show this but the hospitals, the crime and the deteriorated people all are shown to persuade people that this is not a life that is to be desired by anyone. Overall, the use of the blurred images and dark camera are used to detract people away from this type of lifestyle by showing al the negatives that come with living like that.

The last visual method that TI uses in the first section of the rap is the demonstration of how the path will not be easy and it may be one that only you can follow and nobody else can take you there. The visual that especially represents this well is when TI is driving a car down a road in the middle of nowhere where he is the only one that is anywhere in sight. What is trying to be represented here in my opinion is how the road of recovery is that that is up to you and only you if you want to get where you would like to be. The road both metaphorically and in the video may seem long and lonely but at the end of the road is a better life that you can live at. I think he also uses this visual of the car driving down the road to entice people to reach out to these people in an effort to help them get through their troubles. The somber sight of a visual car and knowing how tough it must be for one person could put a seed of thought into somebody Reaching out and helping someone could be a huge help to someone in helping them start a new life as it is well documented the challenges that these men and women face on their road to recovery. Overall, the usage of the single car was used in the first rap section of the song to entice people to help others through tough times as a recovery session is much easier done with the help of others than if it was done by oneself.

As I was in 5th grade listening to this song in my mom’s car on the way to soccer practice, all I thought of it was that it was just a good catchy song and one that I could try to sing just like all the others on the radio at that time. Little did I know how much the song and especially the music video dug into serious issues, ones that I did not know much about at the time. This song was very good in representing the struggles that people go through in their day to day lives and while some are able to get out, some are still stuck and that is what TI wanted to get across to the world as he wrote this song.


