So this is one of my favorite scenes…
YG floating through the sky, mainly because I love seeing artists happy.
But I remember shooting it and I had the camera and I’m like looking up at him and he was
just happy.
And I don’t think it was just more so like he was happy to be shooting this.
It’s just a happy time in his life.
Seeing him happy like that, I think that at some points he forgot that he was even in
the video.
So “Big Bank” was one of those videos where it was definitely a collaboration.
Like he wanted to go lyric for lyric almost, like, “When I say this, we gon’ see this."
"We gon’ see this."
We gon’ see this.”
And he kind of wanted to have this 90s feel to it where it was more literal than figurative.
And I was like, “That could be cool.”
It could be fun especially for the summer and not really give you too much to think
about but just let you celebrate being rich.
From my standpoint, it was more about like the cinematography.
A lot of the ideas were his and actually I’ve never done a video where it was this kind
of collaboration where it was like me and him 50/50.
So I was like, where can I infuse Taj like the most?
YG really has respect for the Bay, really loves the Bay.
The Bay really supports him.
I’m from the Bay Area so it was important that we had this influence from the Bay but
that was just like… it was natural.
This scene was actually planned to be somewhere else on a golf course.
And there was so much going on.
I haven’t been on a set like this.
It was like in a long time.
It was probably like 300 people on this set.
It was so many people.
It kind of turned into a party which is fun but you still have to get the job done so
it was like, “Look, while everyone is right here, let’s just turn this car around,”
and this is like right by where the trailers were.
There was like a beautiful skyline in the background and we were like
“Yo let’s just shoot it right here.”
So the zoom effect that you see is actually done in post by my boy Dre.
Dre Jones, you know what I’m saying, TPK.
My best friend.
My editor.
I like giving him footage and just giving him the video and let him do his thing.
He’s an artist too.
Editing is definitely an art so I usually don’t even jump in for the first edit.
I’m like, “It’s this scene, this scene, this scene in this order."
"Do your thing.”
And then he’ll add something to it.
He has great sensibilities.
Mustard on the xylophone.
I mean, it pretty much is what it is.
Like when you hear the song, he’s playing the instrument.
When I said that this video’s like literal, it’s like probably the most literal video
I’ve ever done.
But really what Mustard brings to the set is pure comedy.
He like lightens the set.
Like Mustard comes on, he’s just funny.
I remember in this scene…
I remember in this scene, YG walks up to Mustard and he’s like, “Ay I’ma be in this shot.”
‘Cause originally this was just supposed to be Mustard’s shot.
And Mustard was like, “Alright cool.”
And then YG’s like, “I’ma go get dressed for it.”
YG walked off and Mustard was like, “Ay get me by myself man."
"Make sure you get me by myself.”
2 Chainz is someone that our community looks up to in this generation, really looks up to right?
Being like the artist that he is, he’s been in the game for a long time.
The way he looks, if you noticed like when he puts his hands behind his head, he looks
confused like he doesn’t know what’s going on…
But he kind of still does this thing and he comes out powerful from it when we back up,
you know what I mean?
It was more so one of those things when you’re up against you know, police brutality or you’re
up against any type of opposition, you let your personality kind of shine through and
who you are shine through.
So I wanted to put something in there that reminded us of where we were at this time
without speaking too much on it.
So this scene right here, I really loved.
Sean just kind of did his thing.
Put the boy, Kaepernick, who I photographed before, he was an awesome person.
And he’s an awesome quarterback man.
He should definitely be playing right now but he stood up for what he believed in and
the first person to do that is usually like the person that’s sacrificed.
This is like the government trying to convince us that like everything we’re saying is
the truth ‘cause it’s written right here.
And Sean’s like, “Oh okay."
"But you know what?"
"I don’t wanna hear about that knowledge."
"Don’t try to kick…"
" You tryna kick knowledge?"
"Oh you trying to kick knowledge?"
"Get that shit up outta there.”
I was actually flipping through the channels at home in my bed and I saw like this horse
race going on and at the same time, I still had the music playing on repeat, YG’s song.
This was in the very beginning when they first sent me the song.
And I was like, “Has Nicki ever done anything with horses and like the derby and just winning…?”
And she’s kind of talking about winning and talking about who she is, whatever, so
I was like, yo, I wanted this all pink horse and kind of bring her back to like the original
days of Nicki Minaj.
She didn’t wanna get on this horse at first but then she showed up on set and she was
like, and this is my Nicki Minaj impression.
She was like, “Taj why I ain’t on the horse?”
So I was like, “Alright I’ll put you on the horse.”
How to integrate this into the video became a thing between me and YG.
We were sitting at my house playing Madden.
He always looks at me like…
Nah I’ma do my YG impression ‘cause you haven’t got one of these yet.
I gave you a Nicki.
I haven’t give you a YG.
“So you know what we need to do fool?"
"We need to get a girl over here twerking with a Fashion Nova bag."
"That’ll be hard.”
And I was like, “What?”
And he was like, “That’ll be hard.”
So he called someone real quick.
Boom.
Okay now this scene right here, this is like 4 o’ clock in the morning and you guys are
probably wondering, “What’s going on?"
"Is that like a wall back there?”
And this is because YG was like, “We need to do a shot with everyone in it.”
Now my boy Y is the man.
Why is he the man?
Because before, he was like, “I don’t really want a shot with everybody in it.”
But then he decides last minute, I want a shot with everybody in it.
Now here’s what’s special about him is he can make these things happen.
So I noticed on set that their chemistry started before they actually got here.
It was like all love.
When you’re apart of something that is big and you know that it was a success, and you
come back for the video…
The video’s always proof, kind of, that the song, what you created, was good.
Oh my goodness.
I love Stackz is her name.