When A$AP Rocky sat with director Dexter Navy to flesh out the visual conceit for the rapper’s song “L$D,” he wanted it to be “trippy.”
“Whenever a fellow emcee, or a rapper, or somebody puts out a music video that’s dope, I’m either hating or inspired,” Rocky told TIME. “I really enjoy good visuals.”
And what better opportunity to experiment with imagery, than with a psychedelic, drug-induced love song about LSD? The music video borrows heavily from Gaspar Noé’s 2009 psychedelic fantasy film Enter the Void (which, if you ask Noé, also inspired Kanye West’s 2010 music video “All of the Lights”).
“I watched that film,” said Rocky, “and at the end of the day, we wanted to do something that was inspired, that paid homage to it without taking from that storyline or that plot.”
The Jim Jonsin-produced record is the third single from Rocky’s sophomore album, At. Long. Last. ASAP., which debuted at #1 on both the Billboard 200 and the R&B/Hip-Hop charts. This is his second consecutive #1 on the Billboard 200. The Harlem native is currently on a joint tour with Tyler the Creator with special guests Danny Brown and Vince Staples. In January 2015, Rocky’s record label founder A$AP Yams died of a drug overdose.
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