From OF to MMG, Producer Tara Razavi Breaks Down Your Favorite Music Videos

Tara Razavi knew she wanted to be successful, and her parents wanted to be sure of it. They immigrated to the United States a year before their home country of Iran’s revolution, and for them, good fortune could only come from hard work. So like many first-generation Americans, Razavi was subjected to a regimen of rigorous study growing up in Los Angeles.

“In a Persian household, straight As is what you’re required to do,” she says. “That’s not like, ‘Congratulations.’”

Yet sometimes luck comes out of nowhere, regardless of scrupulous preparation. At UCLA, Razavi was on track to become a lawyer – “like every other Persian person in L.A.,” as she puts it – but at her college’s career center, she stumbled upon an internship at Babyface’s Edmonds Record Group. As an avid R&B fan, was immediately hooked. After graduating, she broke the news to her parents: “I’m not going to law school anymore. I’m just gonna work in the music industry for free until I figure it out.”

And that’s what she did for a couple of years, interning at record labels and eventually landing a gig at BET, where she served as a music supervisor for shows like College Hill and Lil Kim: Countdown to Lockdown. There, she was introduced to television production, and soon, she was working on pilots for Oxygen, VH1, and MTV.

It was around this time that she got a call to work on the video for Nas’s song “Hero,” directed by TAJ. “I had so much fun, the client was really happy, and then they kept calling me back,” says Razavi. And she kept taking the calls.

As it were, TAJ was looking for a new producer and asked Razavi to take the job. She happily obliged, and the duo continues to work closely together to this day. Their biggest smash is Jennifer Lopez’s video for “On the Floor,” which has racked up half a billion views and counting.

As a producer, she’s responsible for overseeing and facilitating every stage of a music video’s creation. “So when someone says I want Usher to be suspended in water, then I find a water tank, I find a scuba diver, I find underwater equipment,” she explains. “I do everything to make it a reality.”

In 2008, Razavi founded the production company Happy Place, signing such notable directors as Matt Alonzo and Mike Ho. Happy Place’s roster is full of established and emerging talent, but in the music business, nothing guarantees a hit. “You just gotta approach every single video with the same amount of passion,” she says, “and some of them take and some of them don’t.”

Case in point: “Yonkers,” the major-label debut of a then unknown Tyler, the Creator. Yeah, Razavi produced that video too.

Today, she’s averaging between four and five videos a month, trying to say yes to every job she can. That includes branching out from music videos and back into the television and film. Her days as an undergrad wannabe lawyer seem long gone at this point; now she’s applying her natural pragmatism to something she loves. “Especially in music videos, you just don’t need school,” she claims. “You’d be surprised how much of it is common sense.”

Hodgy Beats, Domo Genesis & Tyler, the Creator – “Rella”
directed by Wolf Haley
Los Angeles, 2012

“[Management calls] me, and they say, ‘It’s time!’ I come down to either the store or the office, and we sit down and talk about it, and Tyler unloads. He’ll say, ‘I wanna do this, and I wanna do that, and I wanna be a fuckin’ centaur.’ With each creative meeting, there was something else thrown out. He was like, ‘And then Hodgy’s gonna get on the back of the truck, and he’s gonna jack off and turn everyone into cats!’

You never stop a creative force like that. Tyler knows what he wants, and it’s exactly what you see. He’s a really smart kid; you basically just facilitate him. His mind is obviously rare. We don’t talk about the meaning of things. We just get in a creative space where we just start having fun. We’re like, ‘What if he slaps a girl and she turns into an Asian?'”

Hodgy Beats & Tyler, the Creator – “NY (Ned Flander)”
directed by Wolf Haley
Los Angeles, 2012

“He had both [videos for ‘Rella’ and ‘NY (Ned Flander)’ in mind] at the same time. We actually shot ‘Ned Flander’ first. We needed more time cause ‘Rella’ was more complicated.

We had to get a real baby. And that was difficult, ‘cause the baby was at that age when you cry all the time. You can’t be like, ‘Take five, baby, do exactly this!’ It was worse than working with the horse [in ‘Rella’].

We found a house that was old – it wasn’t that messy. We basically just came in, added some furniture elements, and dirtied it up completely. Like I think the art director literally pulled stuff out of his trash can and brought it to set.”

Domo Genesis & Tyler, the Creator – “Sam (Is Dead)”
directed by Wolf Haley
California, 2012

“Tyler knew what he wanted. He talked about his idea, and then the conversation got a little more serious ’cause we said, ‘He’s done “Rella,” and he’s done “NY,” he’s done “She,” and he’s done all these videos that are becoming staple Tyler videos.’ And so it was really important with this next video that we did something that would put him on a whole ‘nother level. Like, we had to step up. So when talking out the creative gist, it was just a little more serious. We were like, ‘Let’s get a gun guy, with real AKs.’ And of course it has Lionel, and Nakel doing a flip, and all the funny elements that you are never gonna get away from, but the idea was for it to be a little more serious.”

Swizz Beatz & A$AP Rocky – “Street Knock”
directed by TAJ
New York, 2012

“Anytime you get a call for a video, you gotta figure out the paperwork or whatever, and that takes like a week or so, but we’re so close to [Swizz and his staff]. [His manager] was like, ‘We have to shoot Sunday.’ I think she called us like five days prior, and we had another video right after that, and I was like, ‘What am I gonna do?’ And without even getting the official word from the label, I just asked her, ‘Are we definitely doing this video?’ She said yes. And I was like, ‘Alright, well, we’ll figure it out when I land.’ And we flew out, landed, and scouted and worked it out.

That kid’s [A$AP Rocky] a star. Super swag, came out real confident, he was cool. You work with so many artists, so many directors, and at some point, people just definitely stand out.”

Young Jeezy & Ne-Yo – “Leave You Alone”
directed by TAJ
Los Angeles, 2012

“‘Leave You Alone’ was a concept that TAJ had been wanting to shoot for a while, and he knew that concept really, really well. He knew exactly what he wanted on that one from gate, and that was all him. It’s a love story, and it’s Jeezy’s first song that’s not, like, completely hood. And it’s a story that’s not about black and Mexican or anything like that; it’s just kind of implied. That’s an element of it, but it’s not about that. It’s about her wanting to be with someone that she’s not supposed to be with and all the struggles that come with it. It’s like a modern day, urban version of Romeo and Juliet for all the kids who don’t really know that story.

The casting was very important on this. We had some really good actors. When the dad’s crying, that scene had us all looking at the monitors, jaw dropped. That guy was an amazing actor. The mom was amazing. We really did have to spend more time finding them. Finding guys with tattoos all over their faces, that’s a whole different casting process than when you’re looking for a girl in a bikini. It’s like a mini process on a movie. A lot relies on the director to feed them what they need. TAJ knew this story in and out. I can’t even explain the passion that he had while he was directing this one. It was different than normal.”

Rick Ross – “Hold Me Back”
directed by TAJ
New Orleans, 2012

“That was fucking awesome. Such a fun shoot. New Orleans is amazing – it was my first time there. Beautiful and sad all at the same time. I was so into that shoot. It’s just raw, gritty. The hood came out in full force. I don’t know who [Ross] knows down there, but that hood was happy to see him. I think, honestly, they don’t shoot that many music videos down there anymore since the Master P days, so they were just happy to see us. They came out, they listened to me. Sometimes, you’re on a video for a hip-hop song, and you’ve got literally 100 dudes out there, tattoos on face, and you’re like, “Hey, I need you guys to move!” Good luck moving them. But these guys were all listening to me.

They were happy to see Ross. They loved Wale. Kinda screaming for Wale a little more than Ross.”

Common & Nas – “Ghetto Dreams”
directed by Matt Alonzo
Los Angeles, 2011

“You have narrative videos and you have performance videos, and that was definitely a mix. It was a loose narrative. It’s very literal to the words. It’s about that girl, it’s about that around the way ghetto dream girl. Bria’s [Myles] got that body. And this one was a little lower budget so we had to get a little resourceful. We shot in the studio, and on a separate day Matt [Alonzo] drove around and we just got shots of L.A. to fill in the blanks, and then we [shot in] a friend’s house. So it was really rewarding that people liked it, because we didn’t have all the resources and all the money that we usually do.”

Wale & Miguel – “Lotus Flower Bomb”
directed by TAJ
Atlanta, 2011

“Some [rappers] are into [acting], some of ‘em aren’t. Tyler’s really into acting, and Ne-Yo’s also into it. I think Wale had fun doing that. It was obviously his first time, but he was into it. He did a good job. But it’s different because you spend so much time… like if you were doing dialogue, you have to do take after take after take. God forbid someone accidentally makes a noise. It’s so frustrating. We probably spent four hours on that one intro. In four hours I can light, shoot, five performance takes, and wrap a whole thing. That video was definitely fun. It was definitely a little more challenging though.”