Giveon doesn’t necessarily regret the time and effort he put into building a relationship that didn’t amount to anything, but let’s just say it isn’t something he’s rushing to experience again. “Twenties,” his first lead single in nearly three years, is a reclamation of authority over the musician’s own journey. Behind the scenes at the music video shoot for the record, Giveon explains how the simplistic approach to the video reflects his recent shift in focus and teases his upcoming album and accompanying tour.
“Your twenties, that’s when you’re learning yourself, you’re learning what energizes you, what drains you, you learn even what you want to be in the future,” Giveon tells Rolling Stone. “But if you spend that time distracted by someone else or catering to them, you never even get to develop yourself. Later on, you have to start from scratch. The song is pretty much just an ode to that. I won’t say any names, but just to let them know, might have wasted this time.”
In the “Twenties” video, Giveon performs with a band while flashes of images from his past are projected onto the walls around them. “How was I supposed to know/This is how it’s gonna go?/Thought that if I put you first enough/We would last for sure, last for sure,” he sings. “Remember our first kiss, was in a rental car/Now I kinda wish it was a hit and run/Crazy I let you get this far/But I was just young and dumb.” A memory reel of relationship highs and lows plays throughout the clip as he revisits intimate moments he once believed would blossom into something more.
“I wanted it to be something cinematic and simple, not over produced, not over complicated, because I don’t want to take away from the song,” Giveon says. “I wanted something just easy, simple, emotive and performative and just storytelling. That’s it. I love a simple video. I try not to be a big production guy anymore.”
Giveon’s last music video, for the Give or Take single “Lost Me” in 2022, was a high-end production. There were at least a dozen dancers, rooftop scenes, speeding cars, and at least four location changes. With “Twenties,” the R&B singer opted for a less is more approach that director Loris Russier brought to life.
“Honestly, I’m always just scanning for directors who I think would be able to articulate the vision that I’m trying to portray, storytelling wise,” he adds. “And I’d seen some of his work, and I’d seen the moods, the color, the way he captures, even just black skin in general. It adds a certain soul to it, as well. I’d seen all of it, watched all of his work, and I was instantly a fan. So I knew right away.”
As Giveon enters this new phase of his career and closes the chapter on his twenties — the singer will turn 30 years old later this month — he’s reallocating his time to what matters most to him. “It’s really album time,” he teases. “It’s album time and tour time.”
Source link
