Ciudad de México brims with dazzling yet sometimes fatalistic imagery. Catrinas line many street shops and depictions of Santa Muerte can dot everything from candles to T-shirts. Coming across images of death while navigating the city’s seemingly endless labyrinth of streets and nooks is almost inevitable.
In Cuco’s latest video for “Hydrocodone,” directed by Jazmín García, the 20-year-old singer (who recently signed a seven-figure deal with Interscope) casts the Mexican metropolis as a character while confronting his own mortality, navigating a dream-like reflection of the recovery process following a real-life car accident he and his band suffered last fall.
The video finds Cuco in a full-body cast while contemplating the loneliness that heartbreak and immobility prompt, mirroring Frida Kahlo’s own life-altering bus accident. As Cuco enters a dream-like state, he regains use of his body and leads a funeral procession (presumably his), while the song phases in and out of brief waking moments.
Though the themes and execution are melancholy, the funeral party embodies opposing emotions – attendees almost revel in joy as they deliver the casket to its final resting place.
“Hydrocodone” is the first single from Cuco’s forthcoming full-length album, due in June. “[I’m] ecstatic to put this song out after two years of working on it, having finished it on my Apple headphones in the hotel room off Hydrocodone post-surgery recovering from our accident,” he recently told Zane Lowe on Beats 1. “Hope you enjoy it.”
Watch the video here: