Finals’ first video premiere (double hammer emoji)! From the legendary PTP camp (relevant Finals interview here) comes the the FLY visuals to King Vision Ultra’s “Fangs,” which was embedded in this blog post at the same time as it was taken off “unlisted” status on YouTube.

Shot in the industrial basement of the LES’ Abrons Arts Center, this utterly NYC affair was directed by Shenaia Ramsey and features rapper Desde. I like how Desde raps flanked by pipes, concrete, and PTP crew, with Ramsey’s location and lenswork vaguely recalling the urban claustrophobic experience of Method Man’s “Bring the Pain,” and the scene literally representing the underground. And shoutout flex dancer Ski, whose moves are perfect for an especially serpentine song from KING VISION ULTRA’s 2023 (re)mixtape/album SHOOK WORLD.

Watch the video, and check out what KVU (aka GENG PTP), Ramsey, and Desde had to say about it, the music, and what’s next for PTP. And def check for all of their work going forward. I'll add that I saw Desde perform a bunch of KVU-produced tracks recently and it was crazy! Beats tectonic, raps all-darts. That’s all I’ll say on that.

Desde

Whats your favorite bar on "Fangs"? Why?

“Airheads seek asylum in the sky / so why should I fight my gravitational pull, if pigs could fly too?” 

That’s my favorite bar because it’s loaded lol! But very simple still. At the root of it I’m asking: why would I pull away from my grounding to join you being distant and running away from the grounding essentially, when the impossible can be possible? 

If “pigs can fly,” I imagine anything can come true. I don’t want to be in the air and unfocused and gazing into space when the reality is right in front of me.

If anything can come true I want parts! I want my wildest dreams to be possible and I want to make it happen. 

How is your album with GENG coming and are there any themes developing on it so far?

It’s coming! Slow and steady. We’re making it gem by gem. 

Honestly I suck at writing about my own themes lol! Everything is thematic by nature but it’s always hard for me to pinpoint it with words. I’d ask others who listen what do they hear the themes being? What stands out to them, what ties do they make listening to the music?

I think it’s because all the themes I’m writing about are currently being lived through. I’m tryna understand them myself. 

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KING VISION ULTRA (GENG PTP)

Where did the sounds come from on this music? Idk if that’s guitar, idk if that’s tambourine…the beat sounds like a rattlesnake. 

hahaha i'm def not about to whosample myself to death but the shit is crazy flipped and i think it all comes from only 2 sources. the main chunk of it I chopped in like 2017/2018, originally with some totally different drums, from one of my favorite albums of all time. for the version Desde got, I had removed the drums and layered those sounds with something that i literally sampled and then broke down into stems - so it's not even a standard "drum break." i wanted to expand on the effect of that tambourine... it def sounds like a rattlesnake which is why i suggested "Fangs" as the title in response to hearing what Desde wrote to it ... specifically after "your teeth don't hang low..." like, "bet... that connected the dots."

What’s next for PTP as far as spring/summer shows and releases?

at this moment, the label release schedule is set for a new album every month til November... a lot of surprises and RESIST... comp alumni haha. Plus a book or two.

Show-wise, in June, I'll be in Philly and Atlanta with Dreamcrusher as Centenny Gzzz...plus DJ'ing one night in NYC which is something I rarely do. Amani doing a ton of work with STILL/MOVING. H31R just came back from UK/EU. Dis Fig is touring with The Body. YATTA is back in NYC.  There's a lot of us and a lot happening. I'm personally organizing less in terms of shows and more focused on screenings and space activations with the PTP Archival Coalition. More community markets too. Stay tapped in, you heard.

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Shenaia Ramsey

What did you want to accomplish with this video?

Overall, I really wanted to bring the raw, and gritty feel to life that the song “Fangs” provides. Also, to collaborate with GENG, Desde, and PTP as a whole to make sure their ideas were included too, and I think we did that very well. I plugged the homie Ski in because he's just a crazy dancer all around which also really matched with the rawness of the song-- I really wanted some crazy movements in it to create an airy, spooky feel to compliment Desde’s rhymes.

In the beginning, when I initially was proposed with the idea to do the music video, off rip I was thinking flickering strobe lights, a dark space, dark figures/shadows, and the inclusion of the train because you can hear a scene of the train passing in the song, on top of Desde mentioning it in one of their lyrics. All in all, I am very happy with the outcome of the video, I believe I accomplished everything I wanted to, and I'm so very thankful for everyone involved.

What was it like shooting in the Abrons Arts Center’s basement?

Mannnnn, shooting in the Abrons Arts Center in the basement was like the perfect spot perfect location! Shoutout to maassai for the tour of Abrons first and foremost. Desde, GENG, and I linked up there to do a quick location scout tour back at the beginning of January 2024, a couple of days before the set day and it was fun we were looking at a few different hallway options and stairwells but the basement’s hallway was the one that we knew for sure we wanted to use. The day of the shoot was legendary in my opinion, we had a couple of homies in PTP pull up to be extras in the scene, they bodied and it was very smooth for me, not too much to handle as far as giving directions. Then of course I have experience with shooting with Desde already because we shot “Ock Deli” but I could tell that this shoot would be different because of the different directions and just having to do different takes and different types of shots compared to the one-straight natural shot. So that was fun directing them and reassuring them that she was doing a good job! Everyone on set was just so supportive and uplifting, it was high vibrational the whole set.

GENG, man he’s funny yo, I got to see more of his personality and how youthful he is. It made the set very comfortable to be able to just be myself while staying focused because it was just a safe space. I think my favorite moment during it was doing the one one-on-one shot with Ski dancing. It was very intimate and I don't know I just felt how connected he was to the song through his choreography. Overall, shooting in Abrons Arts Center’s basement was exactly what we envisioned.