Chart Mondays: Camila Cabello Featuring Young Thug - Havana

November 06, 2017 Critic Jonni 0 Comments


Havana (feat. Young Thug) - Camila Cabello |

According to this backdated blog post, it is 6 November 2017, which means that during this week we had a brand new number one on the UK Singles Charts. Yes, that's right, Camila Cabello climbed her way up into first position, knocking "Rockstar" by Post Malone featuring 21 Savage off the top spot. It's been a steady climb for this single, but radio play sure pushed its success - plus it is undeniably catchy. As for the music video, there is a hell of a lot going on with multiple versions of Camila Cabello. I have not been looking forward to writing about this, but here goes. Watch Camila Cabello bring some Latin flair as she performs and acts in this music video for her song "Havana" featuring Young Thug.

Camila Cabello is mostly known for being the first member of Fifth Harmony to leave the girl group; the other girls have continued as a four-piece. All five girls auditioned on The X Factor (US) separately and came third, as a collective, in the second season. Camila Cabello has certainly made impressive strides in her solo career and it seems to have certainly paid off, especially by claiming the UK number one. She needs to keep on to this success though, as we've seen many reach this pivotal point, only to fall dramatically. This song is a collaboration with Young Thug, real name Jeffery Williams. He's had moderate success as an American rapper internationally, but nothing career-defining, unless you count this track. He has made his name known and has collaborated with a whole host of artists. He's bound to have a solo hit sometime soon. This song was written by Camila Cabello, Brittany Hazzard, Ali Tamposi, Brian Lee, Andrew Watt, Pharrell Williams, Jeffery Lamar Williams, Adam Feeney, and Louis Bell.

Directed by Dave Meyers, this music video is a full-on narrative piece with a performance piece set within the story. It's pretty much another film, which seems to be the way music videos are going at the moment. There's a long intro to this, that acts as a double intro, all before the music actually kicks in.

The video opens up with a telenovela. Camila Cabello walks into a bedroom where she sees her boyfriend Juan (played by Marco DelVecchio), and her best friend and the maid, in bed together, then the real Juan comes out of the closet and states that in bed is his twin brother, before he gets down on one knee and proposes. We flit to a couch where Camila Cabello is sitting watching the telenovela, which her grandmother then turns off using the remote.

This is where we see a full family storyline, we see Camila Cabello play Karla, LeJuan James playing the grandmother, and Lele Pons playing the sister, Bella. There's a chat around the table, mainly telling Karla to go out in the world and find life, rather than sitting at home watching telenovelas.

Karla later goes out to watch a film, titled "Camila in Havana". This acts as the main part of the music video, and Karla watches Camila Cabello perform in a club with various guys whilst wearing a stunning red fringed dress. The dancing is on point throughout, and we have to give kudos to the two guys dancing together - just yes!

There's a lot of flirting and teasing going on in the main part of the music video. Camila Cabello brings it for the performance piece, strutting her stuff and bringing all the energy needed. Unfortunately, Young Thug is overshadowed in every way, and we completely forget that he appears on the stage for his part - however, it is needed to break up the song.

Lastly, she follows a shadow outside and slaps this guy, and then lets him walk away because she loves herself more than she loves him; well, talk about being extra - to be fair, that's me all over though. Only Karla isn't happy with the ending, and says so; to which there's a fiction-to-reality moment where Camila tells Karla that if she doesn't like the ending, she should go out and write her own.

So, that's what happens, Karla goes outside and starts to dance like she saw in the movie, and a guy crashes his bike. They dance together on the street, and her sister spots them and she's so surprised. Not only that, but the grandmother seems to also know about it happening, back at the house.

It's a great music video, with the male love interest being played by Noah Centineo. However, the intro is very long but completely relatable to the theme of the song. It does have that Latin flair. I want to give it four stars because the intro is too long, but it deserves five, for sure.
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