Video Chats: Austin Vesely on "Everybody's Something" by Chance The Rapper

"Everybody's Something" by Chance The Rapper is the fifth music video from his infectious mixtape Acid Rap. Starting with "Juice" at the beginning of this year, Chance has teamed up with director Austin Vesely on three of the five projects and has taken distinctively different approaches to each of the videos. We talked to Austin about the goals he and Chance have going into each video, learning from his previous projects, and making something that’s worth revisiting. 

Doug: As you guys continue to work together, how have your goals changed? Have your projects become more ambitious? Is your definition of success, specifically for the video projects, different than it was when you guys started working together?

Austin: I think what’s great about working with Chance is that the goals are very much the same now as they were when we first started working together. We’ve consciously made an effort to make videos that aren’t typical, particularly for the genre. It’s been about serving the song, making a unique or unexpected visual, and most importantly connecting Chance with his fans. If we can add a new dimension to the song with the video while connecting with the audience, that’s about as much success as we can ask for.

Doug: Do the projects you guys work on together usually come as part of a marketing or promotional plan, or is it more creatively driven?

Austin: I think it’s always a balance of both. We like things to be timed right to best serve what Chance’s current short term goal is. In this case we wanted to release something to pique interest for the summer and fall touring schedule. But obviously this isn’t to say that we ever make these things just as elaborate commercials. We want to preserve the artistic integrity of the video itself and make it something that will still be worth revisiting once that short term marketing goal has passed.

Doug: I remember back when we talked about Kids These Days "Doo Wah" you mentioned that it was your first time you shot on green screen. Would you say your green screen skills have matured since then?

Austin: I learned a lot from "Doo Wah" that I certainly brought with me to this project. I hope my skills have progressed, and I can say I definitely garnered new ones through this video. It was a pretty different use of the medium from "Doo Wah," so I had new things to learn, and I’m happy with how it turned out.

Doug: What was the impetus of the "Everybody's Something" music video?

Austin: I wanted to do something high concept for the song because it covers a lot of topics in a very personal way. It has been my favorite song on Acid Rap since it first came to be, so I wanted to take special care of it sort of. Basically the theme of the video is as simple as explicating the first line of the chorus: “everybody’s somebody’s everything.” I wanted to visually communicate the idea that everybody is everything, so I decided to put a whole universe within Chance’s person. There’s literally this celestial universe that we see in this one person, and a whole universe of topics and situations that we see play out as well.

Doug: What were the visuals elements inspired by, like the stock footages and other clips that you guys use?

Austin: I chose the visual elements based on whatever served the theme that I mentioned before. I wanted to pick clips that were visually interesting, relevant to the lyrics, and useful to the theme.

Doug: The tweet sent to God seems to be getting a lot of attention in articles about the video - it's actually mentioned in the title of at least one. Did you guys anticipate that part would stand out to people the way it did? 

Austin: I had no idea that part would stick out. I did it sort of as a joke; it’s an allusion to this Judy Blume book, “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” I thought it was sort of funny, but I also think it’s kind of a big idea, this desire to connect through technology and how Chance extended it to religious uncertainty. It was the best way to visually represent that idea that I could think of.

Doug: Was one of the goals of the video to have singular standout moments within the video itself? I noticed you asking over Twitter what people's favorite part of the video was. Are you trying to create smaller, memorable moments within the larger piece?

Austin: What I like about the video is that it’s sort of a sensory overload. There’s a lot of visual information coming at the viewer all at once, so it ends up serving as a moving collage in a way. I did that intentionally as a comment on how we process information, and on the vastness of a person’s interior conscious space, but also as a way of calling for repeat viewings. I’d like people to go back through and re-examine the moments in the video, because even if it passes in two seconds on screen, I probably spent an hour or more considering what to put there in why.