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Courtesy of MVSTERMIND and Louis Quatorze
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From Southside parking lots to North County floodplains, videographer Louis Quatorze utilized a host of signature St. Louis locations for the video “Mali Moolah,” produced in conjunction with the track’s engineer, producer, songwriter and mixer, Mvstermind. The video premieres, today, here and now.
“He’s a phenomenal guy,” says Muhammad Austin, aka Mvstermind, of Quatorze. “He always does a great job of embodying the track. We sat down and bounced around some ideas. He presented some ideas; I presented some, as well. And then we put things into motion. In talking to him, we wanted to embody certain elements that I was feeling on the track.”
To do that the pair sprinted through a packed, two-day shooting experience, with just a touch of B-roll collected on a third day. Capturing Austin in his element, the pair found room for a variety of location shoots that have distinct meaning to the young rapper/producer.
“I hadn’t shot a music video in awhile,” Austin says. “It was a great feeling to go to all of these different locations. A lot of the wilderness shots… I’m a nature kid. And that place where I’m meditating is where I meditate; that’s my place, my little, sacred space. That little beach spot? That’s where I had my birthday, where I go to relax. The viewer gets an in-depth perspective of me, what I do, what I want to do. There are some private, intimate moments, like me in the studio working."
In addition to Austin, “it was just [Quartoze], his drone and his cameras.”
The most dramatic set comes near to the video’s conclusion, as Austin’s childhood home, located near North Grand and Natural Bridge, is incorporated. Though the home’s fallen into disrepair, you can still see the elements that made it a solid, desirable, even lovely building not so long ago.
“That was pure energy,” Austin says of that location visit. “It’s a two-story, all-brick house that my parents bought from the LRA when we were little kids. They put their life and energy into that house. We owned our own home, which is a beautiful thing. I remember him working on the electricity to the house; when we moved in, there was no electricity, no water, anything. I remember my pops constantly working on it. We ended up moving to North County and I went to college.”
Reflecting on Quatorze’s time with him, Austin says, “he likes to keep it pretty simple, not all bells and whistles. It’s guerilla style for him. He’s creative and straight-to-the-point. Honestly, I really haven’t met too many videographers that can do what he does. His storytelling is completely within the visuals and align with my lyrics. It’s cut to the beat, it moves to the beat. He does an excellent job of embodying the concept I wanted to portray and that we had talked about. We wanted a message that resonated.”
He adds that “I’m hoping… well, I feel pretty confident that this is a moment that I’ll look back on and it’s catapulted me where I need to be. The music is where it needs to be, the visuals, too. I’m constantly trying different approaches.”
That includes ways in which to promote. Once, when Tyler, The Creator was booked for a Pageant gig, Mvstermind tried various approaches in getting onto the gig as an opener, including some Facebook campaigning. When nothing stuck and the night of the gig rolled around, Austin was on a truck outside, performing to the audience as they awaited entry, a time that he says “was a memorable moment for people that saw it. And it was fun.” Though he jabbed the bear, he says that “I hope they’ll have us back. I really want to do a show at the Pageant.”
As part of the M.M.E. collective (with Con, Ciej, Mir, Lyrique, Dante Wolf), Mvstermind wants to make 2016 the year in which their independent work gets the attention of ears (and eyes) nationwide. After three tours, the process has already begun.
The collective’s page can be found here; you can find them on Facebook here.
