A Tribe Called Quest "Electric Relaxation" dir. Josh Taft (1994)
One of my personal fave rap vids. I think it's better than the Pharcyde's Passing Me By, even. The weird audio mix is actually part of the originally released video, and I could only find YouTubes..
The vid still holds up, imo. I think this vid will last for a long time.
KEV: Where do you see their chemistry (or is it lack thereof) in this?
Interesting to note, I believe Taft was a part of the notorious PROPANGANDA FILMS. As a young company, their entire roster used nyc as a constant backdrop (a city that housed their main office - above a furniture store!) which made the environment feel very mid 90's in style. Think early Fincher, Jonze, Belectic, Ariola.
It's a smooth track with a very flat video.
classic song. this video is a great document.
The lack of chemistry is subtle, but it's there. It takes time to learn good human chemistry.. I'm a complete doofus.
As someone who's basically lived his life thru MTV, this one's very rich with memory, some of which you noted.
I'd say this is in my top 50 fave rap vids.. Just above Tony! Toni! Toné! "It Feels Good".. :)
Maybe someday me or someone else will write a book/DVD about the Propaganda era. I think it may take some more years though.. I'm starting to get a good sense of what the history of mv really means as a 'story', and how it all ties together.
Kev, besides being full of great directors, what was it that made Propaganda so distinctive? At the risk of sounding as young as I really am, can I also ask why you'd refer to it as an era? I'd love to hear your take on the history of music videos as a 'story' too. Also, what was World War 2 like, Grandpa?
KEV: "The lack of chemistry is subtle, but it's there. It takes time to learn good human chemistry..." I think what you're saying is: "Man, I would've really liked to have found a better group shot than what I have posted above."
SPIT: Propaganda was one of the forerunners in selling younger directors as a viable option for commercial agencies. They were signing people straight out of school willing to make a mess in the guise of 'cutting edge' work. The house kinda coincided with the rise of MTV and took home almost every major award, every year.
At one point, Propaganda (and sister company Satellite) had everyone under their banner. Fincher, Jonze, Romanek, Gondry, Bay, Sena, Belectic, Fuqua, Harrington, Proyas, and Simon West (to name a few!)
I know a guy who helped Steve Golin (the founder) in the early stages of financially setting the place up. He says the man was an insane hustler. Would buy a building with no money. Fill it with rented furnishings. Cram a crazy amount of agency meetings in that week. Then give all the shit back - but walk away with like 3, 4 jobs. Incredible!
Wikipedia has a nice little blurb on the guy:
Kev I'd love to hear your stories. I was still in highschool trying to land a gig with them - naively posing as a treatment author (with completely fabricated treatments and boards) and actually saw a number of incredible little things they had in their offices. For instance, rooms with director's last names on the door. You'd walk down the main hall and a white door would have bold black letters above: FINCHER. Another, WEST. etc etc.
I actually still have a number of 3/4 reels of theirs. I have a Jonze reel that is literally over 30 minutes long. So so awesome.
Everyone was really happy when they folded. Their projected jealousies became a manisfested reality. But in the end it was no fold at all, just a simple change of the guards.
Cause they went 'bankrupt' but then reopened as Anonymous Content some 6 months later. This all happened around the time the industry shifted hard (the effect of napster/911/etc) - and most of the top talents had moved on.
I'd love to hear differently, but commercially, MJZ pretty much holds top rank. And it's almost impossible to view modern promos as profitable at all.
Yeah, forget my comment about chemistry. I'm horrible at that anyway..
fist of all, damnit I wish more hip hop videos were Black and White. I cant believe ive never seen this. Anyway, i think the video starts off pretty nice, but seriously goes to shit once they get in the diner. The edit just becomes completely wrong and from then on it just goes nowhere. And the whole woman/man person we keep seeing that stares at Tip at the end? Feels like that was part of a larger idea than didnt happen. One of the best tracks ever. By far this is better than most Hip Hop vids today though.
Lusk: thanks for the info.
Definitely a great video, and yeah does anyone know who this person is supposed to be:
btw Kev: You wouldn't happen to know if this video is on any DVD comps would you?
Yep, it's on Tribe's own Video Anthology DVD. I haven't gotten it yet cuz the video quality is rated sub-par at Amazon: "It looks like the music-videos were just ripped right off a VHS master and slapped on a DVD."
Anyway, I just bought it so I'll let you know if that's true or not in a few days. (And, technically, I like Award Tour and Scenario better than this, but they're all great rap vids.)
Looks like it's on this one also. Along with some other great videos.
otc: I finally got this in the mail, and the video quality's great. I put a nice crisp screen cap up top. ^^^
I'm glad I got it too. I'm guessing it's out of print given it took a month to get me a copy.
