Succumbing to the gravitational pull of giant bags of cash, rapper and 11-time Grammy nominee Busta Rhymes contributed a cameo to Toyota’s “Swagger Wagon,” a faux music video advertising the 2015 Toyota Sienna. This paean to awfulness stars The Neuberts, a fictional, down-to-earth family that loves to get together, dance, and rap about Toyota minivans (but don’t call it a minivan!). It’s every bit as horrible as it sounds, and is also somehow the sequel to a similarly themed, yet Busta-less counterpart from 2010.
A car company signing off on a clueless ad campaign is nothing new, but Toyota seems intent on plumbing the depths of unintentional cringe comedy with “Swagger Wagon.” This is not the face of a man having a good time.
“You pull up rims shinin’ / Trust me, I’m diggin’ your wagon,” Rhymes lies in his featured verse.
But perhaps there’s no such thing as bad publicity, and perhaps the only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about at all, but those old saws were created in a world without “Swagger Wagon.” This is now a worse world, and Busta Rhymes is a sad and integral part of its creation. This is no way for a man with an island named after him to act.