Troy Ave - Appreciate Me

What this video is

Released in December 2016, this video lands at a pivotal and turbulent chapter in Troy Ave's career. The Roland Collins album — named after his legal name — was released in August 2016, just months after his arrest stemming from the Irving Plaza shooting incident in May 2016. The video's emphasis on domestic life, fatherhood, and material success functions as a counter-narrative to the chaos surrounding Ave at the…

Why it matters

A representative artifact of the 2016 independent New York street rap video format — low-budget, high-authenticity, lifestyle-driven. The video exemplifies how Brooklyn artists of this era used music videos as personal testimony and brand-building tools outside the major label system, prioritizing…