Since blowing up with the dapper anthem “Classic Man” in 2015, Wondaland Records lyricist Jidenna has been bringing his A-game to visuals like “Little Bit More” and his latest release, the powerful “Chief Don’t Run.”
Before performing on 33rd street for the 2016 MTV Video Music Awards pre-show by New York’s Madison Square Garden, Jidenna hit the white carpet and told Billboard the inspiration behind his most recent visual.
Jidenna Delivers Powerful ‘Chief Don’t Run’ Video
“It served partially as a prequel to “Classic Man” like who was this guy? Let’s see the narrative of him and his mother when he was younger and when they first moved to America,” he explained. “The second part is, I think it’s important to understand the dialogue between the whole community so it wasn’t just the organizer and the police officer but the guy getting arrested, the construction worker, everybody.”
He continued, “If we don’t start listening to each other then we’ll never get anywhere and if we’re just talking over each other on any side of the argument so I wanted to make sure that people understood that we have to listen. We have to have the dialogue and we have to see ourselves in the other.”
Jidenna also assured that his highly anticipated debut album Long Live The Chief will come “in a couple of months.”
Watch the full interview above.
