Screen grab from “Cycle of Nightsmares” Music video - Shot on Black Magic 2.5K cinema camera in the attic of a house being built.
Every year around this time, I can’t help but think about e-dubble. It’s been 5 years since his passing.
ATB Productions connection to e-dubble goes way back. My buddy from high school, Will Hemsley, introduced me to e-dubble. Will’s the artist who’s responsible for the cover art to Reset and Two-Tone Rebel, they also used to freestyle together a bit, and he told me about e-dubble and his skills. He showed me the “Hampden Parks” music video as an example and wanted to see if I wanted to approach E-dubble about making a music video for the Reset Album.
Meeting E-dubble is always memorable, just cause of his sheer size. You only meet a few people in your life that is 6’10”, then for him to be cool, funny, and an amazing rapper is just added bonuses. E-dubble lived in the Hampden Mansion at the time, and it was like walking into one of those influencer’s houses in California. Just wide open, Huge TV, Ping Pong table, Green Screen, it was crazy.
The song, he wanted to do was “Cycle of Nightmares”, which from an outsider's perspective didnt’ feel like the “single” but more a deep cut with meaning vs something like “Coming of Age”, but I was a fan of the song in general.
Will Hemsley was set to direct, and we used his RESET cover reference of the kid being raised by TV as kind of inspiration. Evan and I were the same age so a lot of images and tv shows we both grew up on, so we worked as many in there as I could. I only knew Evan for a brief moment at this time, in retrospect, I should have included some more “Philly” sports moments.
Before the release of the video, I was only partially familiar with Evan’s music. I listened to "Reset” and “Cycle of nightmares” tons because when you are the editor for a much video you kind of get burnout on tracks hearing them on repeat, but it wasn't until the comments started rolling in on youtube did I see how much of a dedicated fan base e-dubble had.
So, many people thanking him for being a bright light in their lives, so this led me to listen to “Freestyle Fridays” in order on a long drive I took to Charleston, South Carolina, and I found myself becoming one of those dedicated fans.
We went on to do a bunch of stuff.
THE GREY
A house party at the Hampden Mansion. Good times at a legendary spot in Hampden, “shout out to people living up in the mansion” We kind of just shot two performances and then had a good time. I loved the lazers that were at the party, that we wound up bringing them to the basement of my house and doing a few more clean takes of the versus to mix in. Andrew Caughy from Acrylic did the animations, which I loved. I also like the fact that we over the Black bars sometimes to create a 3D effect.
Green Lights came about by accident. I had just got my hands on a Canon 5D M3 and rented a lenses set for a music video shoot, however, that shoot got cancelled and I’d already paid for the lenses rental. I hit up e-dub and asked if he had an old song he’d want a music video for, I was going to shoot with the lenses regardless, as I wanted practice, and I loved e-dubble music.
He thought “Greenlights” might be a good choice and that night, he was doing a recording session at the Line Up Room. I came through and shot a verse or two of him in the studio, then cut it together with bunch of Broll I had from that night/next day. Shot mostly in Hampden, and features a performance by e-dubble outside of Frasiers. There is a moment in the performance when Evan says “one of these days we will hit Hawaii” where I think we linked creatively and were friends after that.
FWT - e-dubble had now moved to Federal Hill into one of those loft buildings down there. I remember the first time going over there. As soon as I got off the elevator I smelled weed. I walked all the way to the last door in the hallway and it was a long hallway and knocked on Evan’s door. He opened it to a cloud of smoke and a beat bumping, I’m sure the neighbors were stoked about getting a rapper on their floor. I didn’t hang out with Evan too many times there, but we did get to shoot the interview session for the “Surrounded by Giants” video and the “FTW” music video.
“WHAT IT DO”
This video was kind of crazy. Evan and his family would go to this “Philadelphia Folk Festival” as kind of a yearly traditional they would have a few RVs back to back and people would camp out with music and parties throughout the day and night. It was Evan’s idea to shoot a video there and I think he was right as it was good times. Evan, wasn’t his normal self for these days though, he didn’t want to be on camera, which is fine, but also wasn’t in the best mental state. I think this song is kind of a testament to the power of e-dubble. This song is undoubtably positive and amazing, I bump it often when i want a positive pick up. So Evan’s turning what troubles him into light as much as he did was so cool to see and i think this video embodies that.
Evan’s family makes a bunch of appearances in this video as well as a bunch of shots of my feet.
Two Tone Rebel.
This video is hard for me. We shot this video literally about a week or so before Evan passed. The concept was once again based off the Cover Art that Will Hemsley created. e-dubble was living in Fishtown now in Philadelphia and had a cool loft style apartment next to a bar that he would regularly perform at “The Fire”, so we decided to rent the bar out for a music video shoot. Shoot during the day and then film a live performance at the venue at night. I’m also disppointed when I watch this video, if I knew this was going to be our last music video, there is zero chance, I’d go this route. Basic concept, Evan is like “John WIck” with a Blade Runner color scheme. He had just gotten “Clark”, so we thought. Someone steals Clark, e-dubble has to come kick butt to get him back. The night before the shoot, Evan calls me and says he’s not feeling too well, he’s got the flu, and been in bed for a few days. He said he still wants to try and shoot, but will have to play it by ear. That day, Evan, was supposed to be in the video in a bunch of scenes, but just wasn’t’ feeling well and he wanted to make sure he could perform at night. He came to set when it was absolutely needed, and did a great job. When it came to the performance at night, Evan went on last and did a good job, but I could tell he wasn’t feeling well, as he wasn’t as crisp as he normally is. (side note) I only recorded his “Two Tone Rebel” performance that night, If I had known, I wish I rolled the whole time.
A few days later, I hear he’s in the hospital, I like everyone else saw the instagram pic of his hand, and I literally thought he had beat it, only to be shocked a little bit later.
I couldnt even look at the footage for so long after that. I was already pretty far along on the edit when I heard the news, but it was so hard to look at footage.
The next video I made for Evan was definitely the hardest, a tribute video to the legend. I asked for anyone and everyone to send me clips and tried to do an overview that would work. Super tough edit, but it was going to be played as at tribute at the funeral. I gave it my all.
I still listen to e-dubble often and so does a lot of people with over 500K listeners a month on Spotify which in my opinion doesnt have all the good ones on it. I’m forced onto youtube and Soundcloud to listen to the other gems, so
PS, I still have no idea what BLACK PAISLEY means.
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