Archive 2004.02: May 2004 - August 2004 | back to 2004 Archived News

(August 31, 2004)  JC PENNEY COMMERCIALS
The Little X-directed commercials for JC Penney's back-to-school campaign premiered on American television stations in late-July.  The pair of clips, entitled "Class Picks - Rock Your Body", feature students dancing around the school (on a school bus, in the hallways, in the gym, in a classroom, in the cafeteria, etc.) while a CGI (computer animated) character dances alongside them.  The track playing in the background is Stagga Lee's "Rock Ya Body".  While the concept is pretty simple, it is all done in Little X's signature visual style.
(Just a little trivia.  Two of Little X's previous projects have been shot in a school setting: the music videos for As If (Blaque) and Freak Of The Week (Marvelous 3) were both shot in real schools.)

(August 29, 2004)  KESHIA CHANTE & KANYE WEST VIDEOS
The Little X-directed video for Keshia Chante's Does He Love Me premiered 2 weeks ago on Canada's MuchMusic as that week's featured video "The Big One".  You can view the video and behind-the-scenes footage in streaming format at keshiachante.com or Vik Recordings.

Little X shot a new video for Kanye West's upcoming track Workout Plan two weeks ago in Los Angeles.  Word has it that the video is AMAZING, so be on the lookout for that...

(August 5, 2004)  MTV VIDEO MUSIC AWARDS
Nominations for this year's MTV Video Music Awards were announced last week, and two Little X-directed videos have received a total of 5 nominations.  X's video for Usher's Yeah! has been nominated for 4 awards: Best Video of the Year, Best Male Video, Best Dance Video, and Best Choreography in a Video (for choreographer Devyne Stephens).  X's video for R. Kelly's Step In The Name of Love has also been nominated for Best R&B Video.  This year's awards will be held on August 29 at 8pm on MTV.  This year marks the first time that the awards will be held outside of New York and Los Angeles, and the first time that it will air on a Sunday (as it has previously aired on a Thursday night).
click to go to MTV VMA 2004 page on MTV.com

(July 26, 2004)  LITTLE X'S 4TH ANNUAL CARIBANA BASH
The annual summer bash Caribana is taking place next weekend in Toronto, and Little X is hosting is 4th annual Caribana bash, dubbed this year as Little X's 4th Annual Karibana Crunk Fest.  The details are as follows:

Maxamus Entertainment Presents:
Little X's 4th Annual Karibana Crunk Fest
Sunday, August 1, 2004
@ Lucid (126 John St.; site of the old Playdium, next to the Paramount theatre complex)
hosted by Mr. X & Kardinal Offishall
and featuring Lil' John & the Eastside Boyz
click here for e-promo

(July 22, 2004)  ***KEISHA CHANTE VIDEO SHOOT SET REPORT***
I had the opportunity of visiting the set of Little X's most recent video project: a second video for Canadian R&B singer Keshia Chante.  The video was for the track Does He Love Me, the follow-up single to Bad Boy (which X had also shot a video for a few months ago).  The shoot was originally to take place at a local plaza in Brampton, Ontario (a suburb of Toronto, Canada), but the location was changed to the parking lot of a nearby high school and community centre.  While the shoot was supposed to span the entire day from morning to night, a huge thunderstorm in the area delayed most of the shoot until later at night.  I got to the set around 9pm and shooting was already underway.  Extras had been recruited via the official KeshiaChante.com website earlier last week, and by the time I got there the parking lot was packed with kids, suped-up cars, and video equipment.  The basic premise of the video was Keshia & friends chillin' in a parking lot.  Apparently, footage shot during the day involved Keshia and her friends riding mini motorcycles.  The footage at night included choreographed and 2nd-unit random dance shots, as well as rehearsed scenes with Keshia and her male love-interest (the same guy from her Bad Boy video).  Click below for a series of night-shots (that I took) as well as some daytime shots from Mishee, who was also on set.
(thanks to Michee for the photos and to JK for info on the shoot!)
go to KeshiaChante.com for more photos from the video shoot

These photos taken by Michee:

These photos taken by Jey:

(July 13, 2004)  X SHOOTS VIDEO FOR THE THRILLS
Little X was recently in England, where he shot a video for Irish rock band The Thrills.  The video for Not For All The Love In The World will be the first release (in North America) off their upcoming sophmore album Let's Bottle Bohemia (to be released in September 2004).  The first release in Europe will be the track What Ever Happened to Corey Haim.  While Little X is known primarily for his videos for urban artists, he has shot videos for rock bands in the past.  In 1999 he directed the video Freak of the Week for the band Marvelous 3, and earlier this year he shot Clarity for John Mayer.

(July 13, 2004)  JC PENNEY COMMERCIALS | UPCOMING KESHIA CHANTE
Little X recently completed a pair of commercial spots for an upcoming Back To School campaign for U.S. retail chain J.C. Penney.  His next project is a second video for Canadian R&B singer Keshia Chante.

(June 28, 2004)  NEW NELLY, R. KELLY, BEENIE MAN VIDS | X'S SITE UPDATED | MELANIE DURRANT LINK | INTERVIEW
Little X directed a new video for Nelly, for his track Flap Your Wings.  The video premiered this past Wednesday (June 23) on BET 106 & Park.  Watch the video in streaming format over at launch.yahoo.com.  The R. Kelly video U Saved Me premiered also premiered this past Thursday on BET 106 & Park on Thursday (June 24).  It is reported that the video is credited as directed by "Julien Christian Lutz" (Little X's real name).
(thanks to Julian R. for the info)

The official littlexonline.com website has updated with new video clips & image capture gallery.  The site has added video clips for the brand new Nelly video Flap Your Wings, Kelis's Trick Me, and a beautifully shot black & white video for the new Beenie Man track King of the Dancehall (which I was previously unaware of until it was posted on the site).  Image stills from older videos such as Destiny's Child's Bootylicious (remix) and Ghostface Killah's Cherchez la Ghost have also been added in the gallery section.

For those who haven't seen the Little X-directed clip for Melanie Durrant's Where I'm Going video (which has only gotten airplay on Canadian station MuchMusic), here is a link to the Universal Music website where the video is posted in Quicktime, Real Video, and Windows Media formats:
http://universalurban.com/melaniedurrant/

Little X is featured in an interview/article in the premiere issue of Smooth Girl magazine.
click here to read article online
(thanks to MT for the info)

(June 22, 2004)  KEVIN LYTTLE VIDEO PREMIERES | LITTLE X ARTICLE IN UPCOMING ISSUE OF "KING" MAGAZINE
The Little X-directed video for Kevin Lyttle's Turn Me On has been finally released.  The video was shot in Toronto at the end of last summer (August 2003) but put on hold for the past 9 months.  It made its official premiere last Friday on BET 106 & Park.  Perhaps the record company wanted to time the release of the single with the beginning of summer, as both the the track & video have a summertime feel.  The video features a huge crowd of Carnival/Caribana-type party-goers and masqueraders dancing against a plain red background.  The simple video captures the mood of the song and partying mood of the summer festivals.  X's version is the 2nd video to be shot for this track.  The original version was shot by Rodney Garraway back in 2002 when the track was released (and became a hit) in the UK.  The full video can be viewed at kevinlyttle.net
(thanks to JB for the info)

Look out for an article featuring Little X in the upcoming issue of King magazine (July/August 2004 issue).  Directors Mr X. (a.k.a. Little X) & Benny Boom, and Farnsworth Bentley are interviewed aboard a luxury private jet.  The interview and photos are presented in a four-page spread.
(thanks to Celine W. for the info)

(June 21, 2004)  LITTLEXONLINE.COM | NEW KELIS & KESHIA CHANTE | MUCH-ON-DEMAND | NEW R.KELLY VIDEO
Lots of Little X news from the last month and a half since I last updated.

First, the biggest news from the past few weeks is the launch of X's new official website littlexonline.com.  The site had been in the works for some time now, and officially opened in late-May.  The simple, yet impressive, Flash-based site includes an official bio for Little X as well as an abundance of content in the form of video clips & image gallery.  The video clips are presented in Flash format, and include a selection of 15 videos & commercials that he's done.  The videos range from recent favorites such as Sean Paul's Gimme The Light and R. Kelly's Happy People, to the rare commercials for Ikea (featuring Billy Idol), an AIDS PSA commercial featuring STOMP, and a recent Guinness beer spot which was previously only airing in Jamaica.  The gallery section includes screen captures of his music videos, including ones for his most recent videos by Keshia Chante (Bad Boy) and Kelis (Trick Me).  The site was created by the Brooklyn-based multimedia design company eflatonline, which also created the official site for director Benny Boom's company GorillaFlix.com.

As mentioned before, X has shot two new videos which have premiered in the past 2 months.  The first one is Trick Me by Kelis, which was shot in mid-April in Toronto and premiered in mid-May.  The video, which has only been released in Europe, is a really simple video featuring Kelis and a bunch of dancers against a bright orange background with arrows.  Screen captures of the video can be viewed at littlexonline.com and the full video can be viewed at Kelis's official website at www.kelis.co.uk/trickme/.
(thanks to GV and jrcrave for the info)

The second Little X-directed video is for rising Canadian R&B singer Keshia Chante's track Bad Boy, which was shot early-May in Toronto.  The video premiered late-May on Canadian music station MuchMusic.  Streaming video clips of the video, as well as a behind-the-scenes clip from the video shoot featuring Little X, can be found at keshiachante.com.

As mentioned in the last update, Little X appeared on MuchMusic's MuchOnDemand show with fellow director Benny Boom, model Melyssa Ford, and Farnsworth Bentley back in mid-April.  Their appearance on the show coincided with the Men In Suits party that they were hosting that weekend in Toronto.  The four-some also taped an episode of MuchVibe which aired on MuchMusic in mid-May.  Mishee was at the MOD taping and sent in these photos for me to post.
(thanks to Mishee for the photos!)

Little X shot a new R. Kelly video U Saved Me in late-May, on location at the Congress Centre in Chicago.
(thanks to JB & Sampy500 for the info)