Did Apple give T-Pain an iPhone 5?

Okay, so Apple probably didn’t actually give a drool-worthy, all-glass iPhone prototype to T-Pain to show off in a music video. But something about this looks like a paid placement. See what I mean.

T-Pain has a new song called 5 O’Clock, an infectious melody about staying out late in the club. Rapping on the track is Wiz Khalifa, who drops this lyric:

“Too many thirsty girls up in this club for me to leave here with one of them which is why I call her.

You’ll be right at home waiting for me, iPhone plugged in the wall just waiting for me.”

Whenever you hear someone mention a brand in a song, they’ve probably gotten compensated for it, either with free stuff or with cash money. Apple products show up frequently in movies and TV shows, but I’ve never heard the iPhone mentioned in a song before.

The music video, meanwhile, shows T-Pain and Lily Allen texting each other. Lily has what looks like a white iPhone 4 in a case, while T-Pain has a futuristic clear-glass phone that looks like a fantasy iPhone prototype.

We know T-Pain does endorsements. He has, for example, an endorsement deal with the drink Nuvo. T-Pain mentions Nuvo once in the song, and Nuvo bottles shows up at least twice in the video, including in the same shot as the futuristic iPhone.

Did Apple have nothing whatsoever to do with this placement? And if they had something to do with it, did it involve giving T-Pain permission to conjure up an imaginary, all-glass iPhone to get people excited about some future product? Or is that the next product, and this is Apple’s coy way of setting people’s expectations high, so the reveal moment is that much cooler?

I don’t know. I’m just glad Wiz Khalifa wasn’t contractually obligated to rap about iCloud.

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Here’s where you can get the full track on Amazon: