Macaroni and cheese. Peanut butter and jelly. Hide and seek. Cookies and milk. Research and development. Crime and Punishment. Surf and sand. Fish and chips. Cheeseburgers and fries. Mom and dad. Marriage and divorce. Weekdays and weekends. The soccer field and Ben & Jerry’s. Mom and another guy. Milk and honey. Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Some things go together like peas in a pod.

But when mentioning things that just go together, how could one fail to mention Owengamingboy and YouTube? Who is Owengamingboy, you may ask (if you’ve been living under a rock for the last few years)? Owengamingboy is the online moniker for a modern Renaissance man, or rather, boy, skilled in Fortnite, music, and Fortnite. Breaking onto the YouTube scene on July 23, 2016, the young man has had a meteoric upswing in popularity in a short two years, boasting over 90 subscribers at the time of writing. A brief perusal of his portfolio reveals a myriad of videos called Fortnite 100 Subsriber suprise countdown.

However, on April 2, 2019, Owengamingboy, never one to rest on his laurels, released a track the depths of which may never be fully understood. Titled “We did it Dumb Officiall music video”, this magnum opus is at once a musical masterpiece as well as a cutting social commentary. Thankfully, this stroke of genius has not escaped the public eye, and already has 19 views. Any more, I fear, and YouTube’s view counter may break.

From the get-go, Owengamingboy wastes no time in subverting traditional music video expectations, as he leads with an all-black intro screen, save for the words “Untitled” stitched across the screen. In this era of commercialization, logos, and branding, Owengamingboy throws all expectations for revenue generation out the proverbial window, instead forcing the viewer to come to terms with the lack of a label for his creation. The viewer, in turn, feels a sense of unease, as he can no longer simply associate a complex musical product into the narrow dimensions of a title. When examining the song, the viewer must face it in its messy, raw entirety.

Moving onto the song itself, Owengamingboy starts off with the question,

Yo! What’s two plus two times half?

Perhaps one of the best opening verses in the last century, this inquiry may seem easy enough to answer, but is, in fact, undecidable, as the half could be applied to the whole sum, or just the latter two. Both readings are equally valid, and throughout the song Owengamingboy forces the audience to come to terms with uncertainty as he does here.

Ostensibly a diss track pertaining to a certain “Alicia”, the composition breaks tradition with its unconventional structure, with Owengamingboy impressively managing to not rhyme a single word. Instead, he opts for a more prosaic, stream-of-consciousness type rap, allowing the listener to observe firsthand his inner machinations. Moreover, Owengamingboy showcases a vulnerability and rawness that not many other rappers are able to convey through their songs when he admits,

I know, I keep stopping, cuz it’s … ummm … new to rapping.

Continuing on to the titular refrain, Owengamingboy declares,

we did it duuumb! … WEEEE DID IT DUUUUUMMMMBBB!

In a clear nod to recent vocal innovations utilized by contemporaries Tyler, The Creator and Playboi Carti, Owengamingboy also emotionally channels his feelings, voice cracks notwithstanding. All the while, a simple piano riff plays in the back, contrasting nicely with Owengamingboy’s syncopated delivery.

The deconstructive nature of We did it Dumb lies in its weaving of many pop elements which when taken singularly are unremarkable characteristics of popular music, but in combination, form an absurdist rendition that would make even Kafka proud. If nothing else, We did it Dumb establishes Owengamingboy as one of the most promising voices of the new generation, and it behooves any self-respecting hip-hop fan to keep an eye on this young prodigy.