Recently, Richard caught up with Sai from Ballistic Productions. They are responsible for all the best videos seen on TV in recent times. They give their honest views on the current state of music videos.

Richard: Not many fans are tuned in to the 'behind the scenes' crews in the desi industry, can you tell us a little but about Ballistic Productions?

Sai: My name is Sai, and I am the director and co-owner of Ballistic productions, the main players in our collective are Danny (producer), Lee and myself. Ballistic productions are well known for producing high quality UK bhangra music videos, and at present we are responsible for most of the phattest UK bhangra music videos out there doing the rounds. We prefer not to be known as a production company as were artists in our own rights, creating the visual aspect of songs.

Richard: What are some of your best-known works to date?

Sai: Our better known works to date are: Mehsopuria - Tumka II & Punoo Haniya; Khiza - Ranjha Jogi; Sukshinda Shinda - Soni Lagdi; Panjabi Hit Squad - Hai Hai; RDB- Unstoppable Medley; and of course J-Skillz - Ke Lenah and Teri Akh Sharabi (that had a real impact at the time and is still one of my favourites).

Richard: Is it important for video producers to like the music that they are making a video to, or do you find yourself thinking 'this is cack, this dude doesn't deserve a good video'? Sai: It's real important to feel the track. Being the director of the videos, I constantly need to come up with new and good ideas so I need to draw some kind of inspiration from the music and visualise the song in order to create a good video to compliment the songs. Mehsopuria, J-Skillz and Khiza are bringing good quality albums to the scene, so I find it a lot easier to come up with ideas plus I always look

RDB's Unstoppable Medley Video

forward to the shoots a lot more if I like the track. There have been a few times where I have had to force myself to like tracks we are working with, although we're in a position now where we can pick and choose who we want to work with.

Richard: Which artists would you most like to work with that you haven't done already?

Sai: I know Danny would like to work with Gurdas Mann, again a real quality artist but personally I think Aishwarya Rai should record her own album and come to us for a video!

Richard: What is your opinion of the standard in Asian music videos today?

Sai: Very poor! No money is put into the videos so there is no thought and the end product is the opposite of what we are doing. We have been told by the artists like Khiza, Mehsopuria, J-Skillz and 2-Dark that we are taking bhangra music videos to another level with what we do but the other videos are taking the industry 10 steps back. Unless the majority of labels start putting money into their videos, the bhangra music scene will not make the impact commercially. I think that some of the videos coming out of India at the moment are top quality and I know the budgets stretch a lot further over there, but a lot of what they do for the money is pretty damn impressive. As far as the UK is concerned, there's definitely room for improvement: most videos are s***, and that is not only my opinion but also the general consensus. We put a lot of time and hard work into our videos doing more than justice to the songs we do videos for. That's why artists like Mehsopuria; J-Skillz & Khiza select us for their video production and come back to us for more videos.

Richard: Are the videos improving? Or are they getting cheesier?

Sai: Since we have been doing our thing people have approached us and said how we have raised the standard of the whole UK desi video scene. Labels can't risk doing videos as cheaply as they were done before, but a lot still seem to have not moved on because now they have to stand up to a new level of quality. I think people have seen a change in the quality of Asian videos and they are less accepting if a bad video is released. Although you've gotta admit some videos are so bad they're good.

Richard: How much input do artists get in the storyboarding of the videos? Is it the case that the producers come into conflict with artists over what would work and what wouldn't work?

Sai: I come up with the ideas and have no problems taking on board artists' ideas. At the end of the day it's their album and their career, however it's my job to put together a video that's going to sell more albums and create more hype about the artists we work with. If we don't think something's going to work then we wouldn't shoot it and we have come into conflicts with artists in the past, where they want one thing and we want another. Still, they've always admitted we where right afterwards! We have a wicked vibe with certain artists we work with and that comes across on the videos, we've become good friends with those artists, it is nice to know those artists respect us as much as we respect them.

Richard: Would you guys like to do a Bollywood film?

Sai: I would love to make a Bollywood film, and who knows, if someone was stupid enough to hand us hundreds of thousands to make one, I'm sure we could come up with something (please make all cheques made payable to ballistic productions).

Richard: If you could pick your top three desi music videos, what would they be?

Sai: If you mean our own videos there's too many to say but off the top of my head I would say: 'Punoo Haniya' (Mehsopuria), 'Tere Akh Sharabi' (J-Skillz) and 'Sunakee' (Mandeep Malli)'.

PHS's Hai Hai Video

Richard: In hip-hop, video producers are sometimes as well known as the artists, Hype Williams for example, do you want the same situation in Bhangra? Sai: We have been on the scene for nearly a year now and it's really strange that people are recognising that Ballistic are behind the videos. People know the name and know what we do, and not just people in the industry, which is really unheard of in this business. It was always something we wanted to happen; we work hard and, like I said before, we are artists in our own right and it's nice for people to recognise our

work and who we are. There are video producers and labels trying to copy the Ballistic style but we're ahead of the game and the future will show our videos are a credit to the UK bhangra scene. We don't pocket the money and do a botch job, we put the money into the video hence the videos are boosting the album sales and breathing much needed artistic freshness into the bhangra scene.

Richard: How long do videos shoots take?

Sai: Shoots usually take two days, but we don't finish some shoots till we believe we have enough footage to edit a good video. The shoots are real long days, usually between fifteen and twenty hours, which has been a shock to most of the artists we have worked with. So much stuff to shoot in such a sort amount of time, 20 hours might seem along time for a days shoot but lighting, camera angles, scenes, location changes, etc, all consume a lot of time. Gone are the days of a camcorder and a couple of mates…well almost. Mehsopuria's 'Punoo Haniya' video was almost three days shooting, one day we shot for over 13 hours without any food or drink breaks but the end product was justice to the hard work ourselves and the artists puts in

Richard: Can we be in one of your videos?

Sai: It depends, it will cost you at least a £500 for every shot you wanna be in....just kidding !! Of course, we're always on the blag trying to get people to be in our videos. Dancers, models, extras, anyone interested, please drop us an e-mail at ballisticproductions@hotmail.com.

Richard: Have you got any more words for the Desitunes4U public?

Sai: Thank you to everyone who's supported us over the last year and respect to Desitunes4u for this interview. I'll try my best to come up with decent videos in the future, but if they become s**t blame the record labels, those cheap skates! Hope to see you all in videos soon. Watch out for "Khiza, J-Skillz & Mehsopuria's" new phat videos produced by us dropping this summer.

Later from SAI

That concludes the interview, firstly a big thanks to Sai for taking some time out to chat to us. If you want a quality desi music video then ballistic productions can give you just that. So get in touch with them via e-mail if you require their services or want to be in one of their videos!