Chris Graham explains the ideas behind some of his clips

CHRIS GRAHAM explains the ideas behind some of his clips


SCRIBE, STAND UP

What: A riot in black and white which which made a star of Scribe.

"When we thought 'let's just do the big party' we knew we were taking a big gamble on whether we would get hundreds of people. I really liked the idea of it being really timeless. I wanted to look at it and not go 'that's so 2003' but for it to have quite a long life. So I was 'let's shoot it black and white, let's just have everyone dressing as themselves and let's just keep it really simple'.

"So there's only 48 cuts in the video. Your average video will have anywhere from 150 to 300 edits and that had less than 50 because there was so much going on in the frame. Scribe opened for De La Soul the night before, so on stage he announced: 'If anybody wants to be in my video come down tomorrow night'. I was in the audience holding my head, saying: 'What has he done? We're going to have a riot on our hands".

"Three hundred kids showed up. We cranked the music and the crowd just went nuts. I told them if they wanted to be seen in the video they would have to be on the left or right side of Scribe - and if they wanted to get in they would have to push their way in, and even if they wanted to push Scribe to get in front of the camera then they could. They saw all that as this crazy permission. But that is where the energy of the whole video comes from."

TRINITY ROOTS, LITTLE THINGS

What: A bittersweet portrait of one generation giving way to the next told through the expressive eyes of veteran actor Wi Kuki Kaa.

"TrinityRoots' brief - and I think this is the only time I had this from a band - is they wanted to draw attention to the lyrics of the song and to the music instead of the video. They wanted people to listen to the music through the video rather than watch the video and hear to the music secondarily.

"The drummer Ricky came up with the idea of a close-up of an old woman and from that then it was, 'What if it was an old man? And what if towards the end of the video he gets close to the point of tears because he's thinking about something that we never find out what it is?'

"Suddenly the video becomes interactive because the audience can interpret the lyrics with the expression on the man's face, and if we don't cut away from that face much at all you are forced to consider the music as the clues or the storytelling to the visuals.

"It did put the lyrics and the song as the primary thing before the pictures.

"It would just be a totally different video with someone else's face. His face and the music and the concept were a real marriage."

DEI HAMO, WE GON RIDE

What: A slick but goofy collision of Kiwi petrolhead and tongue-in-cheek American bling.

"It's a funny one for me because it's the one least like my taste and personality. It was me doing a big catering job to the artist. It's obviously a car anthem so I knew it was going to be a big car video. I was attracted to that idea visually in terms of action and excitement. I'd love do a big car video because I had seen so many of them, although I'm not a carhead whatsoever.

"Sonny [Dei Hamo] and John Chong-Nee [his producer] ... those guys had this ultimate fantasy of living in their own hip-hop video. They wanted the girls, they wanted the cars ... they wanted comedy - all the things they've been worshipping from American television since they decided they wanted to be in the rap game.

"It's still very local and a lot of the lyrics and punchlines are local. When they talk about the girls and the booty ... I was only going to do that in a tongue-in-cheek way and I wasn't going to objectify women - there are going to be girl racer characters who we will see in cars and we also see them dancing. But I'm not going to do any low angles on their asses and that was a bit of a struggle for balance - a lot of the guys on the shoot thought I was way too New Age and sensitive. But the video is a balance of my taste and Sonny's desires. Those guys made the video because they are so comedic and they are such great performers that they took it to another level.