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Musicology is a Prince video released for broadcast and to promote the single. The video was included in an enhanced part of the Musicology album (CD version).
The video was shot in Los Angeles, California over two days in October 2003 and directed by Sanaa Hamri. It is the first promotional video for a song to feature the full line-up of The NPG with John Blackwell, Rhonda Smith, Renato Neto, rad., Greg Boyer and Maceo Parker who went on tour with Prince for the World Tour 2003 just a week after this shooting.
The storyline for this video is a kind of time travel with a 10-year-old Prince (played by Lil’ C) in the sixties who is a music lover (apprentice guitarist with posters of Sly & The Family Stone in his bedroom, who also dances with a vaccum-cleaner as a mic stand) and goes to see his favorite artist in concert. Intentionally or not, the video is full of temporal paradox and anachronisms as the kid buys a Prince 7" record ( Musicology) and attends his concert. Wardrobe-wise, as in Cream, two different styles coexist with the sixties and some contemporary hip hop characters. Among the anachronisms we can note the b-boy stance (during the line about Chuck D and Jam Master Jay) and Earth Wind & Fire’s "Spirit" 1976 album. An autobiographical element is inserted at the end of the video when the father carries his son on his shoulders to put him on the stage for him to dance during the concert. This scene is based on the famous story about when his stepdad did the same for a 10-year old Prince when he took him to see a James Brown concert ("When I was about 10 years old, my stepdad put me on stage with him, and I danced a little bit until the bodyguard took me off." - MTV Interview 1985).
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