Missy Elliott dropped the jam of the late fall yesterday, "WTF (Where They From)," along with a super fun video full of great dancing and not-entirely-terrifying marionettes. The video was filmed around Downtown Los Angeles, but not the one we've come to know lately—while we're all talking about Whole Foods and the Ace Hotel and Soho House, Elliott and her co-director Dave Meyers have shot on the un-powerwashed terrazzo sidewalks, a few less gentrified blocks up Broadway from the Ace, and underneath the Sixth Street Viaduct, just north on Santa Fe from the future Soho House, in an area that's set to become an "arts plaza" under a new, flashier bridge. (The song seems like it might be about cultural appropriation, incidentally.) Let's take a tour of Missy's version of Downtown LA in 2015:
↑ Missy and crew hoverboard dance on an unnamed alleyway just south of the Sixth Street Viaduct, which closes January 3 for demolition. It'll be replaced by what the city hopes will become a new "icon," designed by HNTB and Michael Maltzan—the area under the bridge will be remade into public plazas and parks.
↑ That honeycomb of boxes is also under the Sixth Street Viaduct.
↑ Missy's a VIP, so they apparently turned on the neon art for her at the Pershing Square Metro station.
↑ Marionette versions of Pharrell and Missy dance on the checkerboard terrazzo sidewalk outside of the Norton Building at Sixth and Broadway, next to the Los Angeles Theatre on what's still a pretty old school block of rapidly gentrifying Broadway (well except for the just-reopened Clifton's).
· Missy Elliott - WTF (Where They From) ft. Pharrell Williams [Official Video] [YouTube]
· Sixth Street Bridge Replacement Bringing Upgrades All Around [Curbed LA]