Music Video Review: Music For A Sushi Restaurant by Harry Styles

Is Harry Styles Exposing The Music Industry in a Sushi Restaurant?

We’ve seen him fly over the sea, make friends with a fish, do a full-on dance number on stage and now we’ve seen him as a squid-mermaid-man. When it comes to Harry Styles’ vision for music videos, it might not always make sense at first glance but we know he would never disappoint.

There were mixed opinions on Music For A Sushi Restaurant when the record-breaking album Harry’s House came out. Some said it was a song for commercials -which Apple actually used for one of theirs- and some said it should be the next single so it can be the song of the summer. Whatever your opinion was on the song, I can assure you that you were not ready for its music video. Harry loves to leave the interpretation of his art to the public. So let’s go deeper into the meaning of it and decide if Harry was trying to out the music industry for their maltreatment of the artists.

The video starts with three men finding a rare creature that they kidnap and bring to their sushi restaurant which happens to be Mr Harry Styles himself in his true mermaid self. First, we see him looking pretty scared when he sees all the animals being butchered and understands what’s gonna happen to him. He even breaks the 4th wall for the audience to see how uncomfortable he is.

To escape his faith, he starts singing to their ears and hypnotising them with his voice -similar to mermaid sirens-. Once they know they can profit from him, they start to treat him well and pamper him. We see him becoming a diva, enjoying the treatment and all the gifts. They get him whatever he wants to make him perform and they put on a beautiful sign which has a mermaid that has Harry’s tattoos.

We see him reading the contracts and only singing the line “whatever you want” while throwing the papers away. He gives a great performance, the money is coming in, and the boss is happy. We see Harry doing his iconic “whale” which might indicate that it is truly about Harry and not a character for a music video.

He becomes a star and the public wants more from him, try to touch him and get a piece from him hence the line “Can I touch your tail?” and the slap. Everything goes well until Harry’s voice cracks. Because he is only valuable when they can profit from him. Harry himself talked about this topic in his 2022 Zane Lowe interview “What is so exciting and dangerous about it is that you put so much love into an industry that’s so fickle and it loves you back when you are doing well and like if you’re not… you’re just out.”

We see him fearing for his life and workers starting to sharpen their blades for his end. He has lost his voice, his charm, and his value. After a couple of short cooking scenes, we see the restaurant’s previous sign change to a mermaid cut into sushi pieces indicating his tragic ending.

Obviously, these are all interpretations but isn’t it the beauty of art anyway? It’s a way of communicating but also every single person can have their own opinion which makes it more exciting. Whether you think this music video was a way of Harry communicating his disappointment with the music industry or not, we can all agree that it has the most beautiful visuals and editing. I’d say it’s one of his best works. And I personally would never say no to Harry Styles acting like a diva, covered in glitter.