Dizzy Rascal - Dream

The iconography of this video mimics the 50's show muffin the mule, down to the woman playing the piano. The woman in the video represents classic conservative, white, middle class England. She representing the white middle class England, controls the puppets in the video. This creates the binary opposition of the white woman singing and the stereotypical actions of black puppets on the piano.

At the beginning of the video Dizzee Rascal himself comes out of the box as soon as the woman begins to play the music.  This shows that he is self aware that he is being controlled by the woman, who represents the white middle class society, and showing him getting back in the box at the end shows that he is content with it. This could be a point about black artists having to give up on some of the aggression that is drawn from grime and replace it with pop to gain mainstream appeal and that in this way he has sacrificed to get where he is.

The puppets themselves all show representations of people from the street level of England, the young, mostly black, men all being stereotypical acting puppets shows how people from the woman's perspective of society view young working class black men, as well as the fact that they are on strings showing that they are being controlled by the society.

Later in the video the representation increases as the police come in with helicopters and cars, making the woman recoil and cringe at it, with a police officer puppet beginning to beat up the two black guy puppets from the beginning. Although despite being in a position of power over those being victims of police brutality, the officer is still on the same strings as all the other puppets, showing the opinion that even in real life who have more powers over others are still at street level and being controlled by the society.

The change of scenery to a recording studio as the lyrics explain how he got there. The policeman puppet is shown banging on the window trying to get in to continue fighting with them but is unable to. This showing how Dizzee's music career has allowed him to surpass the everyday struggles on the street, of police brutality to relative comfort. The woman's face changes to polite concern as the scene changes to one of his performances, it represents the society questioning whether or not he has been given too much power and influence for where he came from. He however is also shown to be taking advantage of the system by having the woman hold up his album, this could also represent how he is now appealing to a mainstream audience.

The song itself then goes into his advice for people aspiring to get where he is, there is two notable instances in this section, the first being the woman nodding to his message of "keep school in your plans" showing how he has to put messages approved by society in his music now. This must be significant to him as he would not be used to feeling pressured to include positive messages in his work as he would have before becoming popular. There is also the subversion of stereotypes in the form of the black man pushing a pram and being shown as a responsible father. This is a clear subversion of the stereotype of absent black father and portrays a very positive message.