Six years ago, while on a trip to Jamaica, Toddla T met Grammy-winning local star Runkus and the two quickly became firm friends. It didn’t take long at all before they started working on music together and an album gradually began to take shape. A couple of weeks ago, the pair released the fruits of their labour, OUT:SIDE, the final part in the latter’s trilogy that includes MOVE:IN and IN:SIDE.
To celebrate the album’s release, Teezy and Runkus are today releasing the visuals for “Pretty Suit” with prolific local legend Chronixx. Directed and edited by The G, the new video celebrates the island, their communities, and also their spirituality.
In a poetic twist, the video shoot was almost derailed by bad weather, but once the clouds broke and the sun returned, it brought a certain magic that they were able to capture on film. “What looked like hard torrential rain started pouring down during the middle of the shoot, me and the team felt a sense of unease,” Runkus says. “However the editor smiles and says, ‘a just the blessings, it soon stop’. Shortly after, the sun came out and so did the people of the community, to witness high-energy performances from me and Chronixx. It was in this moment I remembered the divine place where we come from … It is an intense performance video, fused with original outtakes from VHS footage. This was a special moment, for everyone.”
The album as a whole is a particularly special one for Runkus. Alongside the additional features from Ky-Mani Marley and Zenya, the OUT:SIDE closes with an appearance from France Nooks, a close friend of Runkus and a young artist whose career was just about to take off before he was tragically murdered in 2018.
Speaking on what inspired the track, and the album as a whole, Runkus says, “To say that I only do one or a few genres of music is limiting my scope. I was grown cultural, so that means, Rastafarian roots music, reggae, one drop, dancehall, all that is natural to Jamaica is second nature to I. However, I simply do music, not just reggae, not just dancehall, not just roots rock… I DO MUSIC! That is where all those genres form from, from nothing, from free creativity without borders or restrictions.”
Tune into the “Pretty Suit” video at the top and then take a listen to OUT:SIDE below.
