Video: Well$ – “Black Swan” (Prod. by Shlohmo)

Premiered by Billboard, The Charlotte, NC Rapper Visits A New York City Strip Club For A Video From His Critically Acclaimed MTSYD: The Revenge of the African Booty Scratcher Mixtape

09.04.2014

Critical praise for Well$:

“The album finds the 19-year-old straddling the line between trunk-rattling southern bounce and the witty 16s of any Freshman spitter.” – The Fader “

…a startling peephole into something deeply personal within Well$.” – Pitchfork

“Well$ uses inspiration from his own heritage as well as popular American culture to develop a sound that is distinctly his own, drawing on southern influences as well as his own African culture.” – Complex

“Charlotte, N.C., may not be the first city to come to mind when thinking of hip hop hotbeds, but thanks to a rising echelon of talent, that’s about to change. Leading that charge is 19-year-old Leroy Shingu, who goes by the name of Well$.” – Huffington Post

The Song:

Continuing with the flow of a Week of Well$, Billboard has premiered the video for “Black Swan.” “That was my first time in a strip club,” says the Charlotte, NC born-and-raised Congolese-American rapper. The nostalgic video was shot at Foxy Gentlemen’s Club in Brooklyn, and trails a young stripper’s disconnect and struggle through a hazy lens. “It’s about looking at things in a different way,” Well$ tells Billboard. “People tend to look at a situation like a girl stripping and immediately assume it’s her father’s fault. It’s not always what it seems, life’s not always what it seems.”

A Week of Well$ kicked off on Sunday, on Well$’s 20th birthday, as his critically acclaimed mixtape, MTSYD: The Revenge of the African Booty Scratcher, was made available on CD in a limited addition package that also includes an Immaculate Taste record label t-shirt and poster. On Labor Day, Well$ threw a free concert in Chapel Hill, NC, where he crowd-surfed for the first time atop the jam-packed audience. Next, The FADER debuted a new audio single, “An Awfully Rude Reintroduction,” which is a follow-up to his very first single, 2012’s “An Awfully Rude Introduction.” With the “Black Swan” video having now been released, Well$ will be closing out the monumental week with several more new singles, leading into his performance at the Hopscotch Music Festival this weekend.

The audio version of “Black Swan” was the first release from the aforementioned MTSYD: The Revenge of the African Booty Scratcher mixtape. If you thought the beat was familiar, you’d be right – the song’s production is Shlohmo’s remix of Jeremih’s “F*ck You All the Time.” “When I heard the beat, I just started freestyling to it and the message started coming out,” explained Well$ in his conversation with Billboard. “It’s a cool oxymoron, because the chorus says ‘fuck you all the time’ and I’m trying to convey a message that’s not conducive to that part. I think that’s what made it work.”

Read the Billboard premiere: http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/the-juice/6236695/well-black-swan-exclusive-video-premiere

Watch “Black Swan”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CFn5fFeCpw

Purchase the limited edition MTSYD package: http://immaculatetaste.bigcartel.com/product/weekofwell

Well$ Background:

Like most kids in his native town of Charlotte, North Carolina, Leroy Shingu had a head filled with hip-hop dreams growing up, even trying his hand at freestyling when he was all of nine years old. But a trying background starkly different from the blissful suburban reality of his peers would compel the rapper better known as Well$ to turn that childhood fantasy into a promising career as a rapper. Quietly released in 2012, $ay La V, Well$’ debut EP rose steadily on the Bandcamp charts to peak at number 5 and eventually become the most downloaded album in the Charlotte area. This remarkable ascent as well as the video for the song “State of Ecstasy The Interlude Part 1″ hauled Well$ out of virtual anonymity, and shoved him onto high profile stage performances with artists such as G Eazy, Chris Webby, Johnny Polygon, and one of his idols, Pac Div. His most recent project, MTSYD: Revenge of the African Booty Scratcher was well-recieved by fans and critics alike.