Red Cafe’s “Heart and Soul of New York City” Gets Streetball Video Makeover

We stumbled upon a video “tribute” of sorts, shot to provide a visual counterpart to Red Cafe’s Pete Rock-produced “Heart and Soul of New York City”, conceived and produced by K1X, who as best we can tell is a basketball fashion outlet out of Munich, Germany who have been involved with New York City streetball tournaments for several years. All we can say is that Munich represented NYC streetball most proper.

The idea for the video treatment came from K1X staffers love for the Red Cafe/Pete Rock smoothed out boom bap cut, and after getting label permission to shoot what they call a “poetic clip for the song.” The playground ball imagery is indeed indicative of NYC poetry in motion, and the end result is entirely entertaining to watch.

K1X enlisted the talent of french streetball documentarian Kevin Couliau, who spent time in the five boroughs in 2009, documenting streetball action, as well as director/producer Thibaut de Longeville, who directed the Just For Kicks sneaker culture documentary, and motion graphic designer Vincent Dumond of 360 Creative in Paris. Cameo appearances from New York hip hop and streetball luminaries add spice to the project.

We love to see New York City, and hip hop, represented globally, and this video, and story of how it came to be, is a perfect testament to the reach of NY hip hop culture. Enjoy.

Red Cafe – Heart and Soul of New York City by K1X from K1X on Vimeo.