It’s recently come to my attention that there is a surprising lack of variety in the pop music industry when it comes to hookah-themed music or music videos featuring hookahs. After an amount of research some might mistakenly categorize as “extensive” I have analyzed the finest videos several google searches can provide.
Hookah Bar Song by Khiladi 786 Ft. Akshay Kumar & Asin
“Hookah Bar Song” (2012) is wonderfully amusing and incomprehensible to the average English speaker. This is a song that is best appreciated for its fun sounds, colorful music video, and seemingly compulsive synchronized dancing. The dance introduced by our turtleneck-clad hero, Akshay Kumar, illustrates the proper means by which to pull from an imaginary hookah hanging from the ceiling. The video in question has a puzzling lack of hookahs for a song whose namesake is the place in which people most commonly smoke hookahs.
“Hookah” by Tyga featuring Young Thug
Ahh yes, who could forget the genius that is the hip-hop artist Tyga in his magnum opus “Hookah” (2014)? The music video features several questionably dressed young ladies and the better part of the animal plagues from “Jumanji”. Despite all of the heavy responsibilities that come with caring for a domestic tiger, Tyga still finds time to smoke hookah in various indoor and outdoor locations at all times of the day. It was only whilst living such a full lifestyle of elephant decorating and speaking in tongues at the beginning of his songs that our musical hero was able to come up with such masterful lyrics like
“Audemars on lean, cars on sheen
You white girl but black girl ghetto fly ting
It’s verified, they ain’t on your sea level”
I have no doubt this lyrical symphony will echo through the corridors of history.
Shisha by Massari ft. French Montana
“Shisha” incorporates the best components of the previous two entries; it has beautiful women, and synchronized dancing. Massari and French Montana put together a lovely duet ensemble complete with scenic views of various skylines and red leather vests. Rather than a tiger, however, Massari opted to go with a lion to display his total disconnect with reality. Nevertheless, this entry on the list features substantially more hookahs and Ferraris than the either two entries combined.
Thank you to folks at Young Black Professionals of Houston.
I don’t intend to be mean when it comes to these videos. They are simply appealing to their audience, which is why I only utilized songs that had “hookah” or “shisha” in the title and I only used those videos with more than a million hits on YouTube.
I honestly don’t think these videos are an accurate representation of the preferences or mindsets of most hookah smokers. I have written in the past about the music I choose to listen to whilst enjoying the colorful flavors of a new tobacco. Still it is our responsibility as those who enjoy a good toke now and then to know how we are being represented to the public. Apparently we are most commonly represented with very attractive women and jungle cats so no complaints over here.