HipHopDX Premiere

Ceschi and longtime collaborator Factor Chandelier have teamed up for the new track “Say No More,” the first single from Ceschi’s upcoming Sad, Fat Luck album. In its accompanying video, the Fake Four Inc. co-founder strums his acoustic guitar as he morphs in and out of an animated version of himself.

Surrounded by the looming architecture of the beautiful cathedrals, bridges and canals of Amsterdam, Ceschi reflects on two of his friends’ current legal woes and people he’s lost to drug addiction.

“This video was shot during a time when I was deeply lost and had no idea where I wanted my life to go,” Ceschi tells HipHopDX. “After friends had been arrested and relationships had ended, I decided to travel without much of a reason. Artist Andy McAlpine organized a video shoot during a layover going from Norway to Czech Republic. What you’re seeing here stems from that time period.”

In the YouTube caption, Ceschi dedicates — what he calls the “agnostic gospel song” — to his friends Bobby and Pepe “who are facing a difficult federal marijuana case right now and all friends who have been imprisoned for risk-taking and to those we’ve lost along these alternate paths. This song was created from a cell phone voice memo of a guitar riff I wrote that Graham [Factor Chandelier] then ‘sampled’ and fleshed out a song around.”

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Ceschi, who served roughly 18 months in jail on charges of marijuana possession, knows all too well how the legal system can severely penalize otherwise great people for marijuana-related charges and has watched many of his friends lose their lives to addiction.

His brutally honest lyrics perfectly pepper Factor’s beautifully dark production, allowing his emotions to pour through every syllable.

Watch the Andrew McAlpine-directed video above.