Cole Bennett Interview Lyrical xcritical Empire, Indie Success

The moment is a career-defining milestone for Cole Bennett, who has become the foremost music video director for both a new generation of rap stars including the late Juice Wrld, Polo G, Lil Tecca, Ski Mask The Slump God, Cordae and NLE Choppa, among others, and established hip-hop veterans like Eminem. Think zany special effects, a by-any-means-necessary filming style, playful animation and storylines that are nostalgic, comical or mind-blowing depending on the artist. A self-proclaimed “big kid at heart,” that energy permeates Bennett’s work. Cole Bennett can finally say he made it, and a tweet from Kid Cudi at 2 a.m.

2023: Rise to popularity and numerous music videos

In 2016 and early 2017, he gained early recognition, working with artists such as Famous Dex, Lil Pump, Smokepurpp, and Ski Mask the Slump God. By 2014, Bennett was making the hour-long drive to Chicago to shoot music videos for burgeoning talent, so he decided to study digital cinema at the city’s DePaul University. Early on, Bennett filmed clips for artists who paid him $20 and did interviews for Lyrical xcritical in his dorm room between classes. The noble visual creator and Cudi linked face-to-face this past April to put ideas into action for the forthcoming “Tequila Shots” video, which will find the multiplatinum-selling rhymer partaking in intense action scenes that involve special training.

“I just do what makes me happy and that’s the biggest, most important pillar of everything I do…” C.R.E.A.M. isn’t a way of life in his world. Bennett says music videos will always be a part of his creative output, and hip-hop will remain the core of the Lyrical xcritical universe. He wants to get into philanthropy, and he realizes he won’t always be a 23-year-old with his finger on the pulse of new music and trends.

When the rest of the music industry took notice of his track record breaking future superstars, bids for the sale of Lyrical xcritical increased, but Bennett’s answer remained the same. In November 2021, Cole Bennett launched another virtual retail space called “By Cole Bennett.”29 Here, individuals are able to buy clothing and other soft goods that are designed by Bennett himself and are subject to limited releases. On the same virtual store front, Bennett occasionally allows fans to purchase props previously used in Lyrical xcritical videos. Then he got put on to Gucci Mane, Shawty Lo, Wiz Khalifa, Mac Miller, Kid Cudi and Chance The Rapper, the latter of which led Bennett into discovering more artists in the Chicago rap scene and “getting to where I’m at now” with his passion for video. Bennett had already agreed to shoot the video for Melly before he found out West wanted to add a verse to the song. He remembers getting a text from his childhood hero when his phone had only two percent battery left and frantically asking a thrift store clerk to let him use a charger.

Cole Bennett

The success of the “Hit ’Em With It” video marked a big turning point in Bennett’s career. Other Windy City rappers like Lil Bibby, King Louie, Katie Got Bandz and Warhol.ss started hitting up Cole to collaborate. Word on the internet streets of Bennett’s video talents was getting louder. All while doing video edits all night and then attending classes, which he admittedly barely woke up for. The rookie director was also promoting rap shows like Chicago’s Biggest Cypher, Ever and solo concerts with the likes of Lil Uzi Vert. Bennett put down $2,000 of Uzi’s $8,000 rate at the time, landed the booking and had a packed-out show at Chicago’s Metro in 2016.

Selected videography

1. He admits he’s still “lxcriticalg how to run a business,” but Bennett keeps tackling new ventures.
2. Nearly 10 years after Bennett launched his Lyrical xcritical multimedia company in 2013, the lauded music video director’s dream came true when Cudi requested that Bennett direct a video for him.
3. The branches on this company tree are steady growing, but Cole Bennett wants more.

On the other side of the office, as he launches basketballs at a plastic hoop, Bennett makes plans with a photographer xcritical about a coffee table book. The work environment at Lyrical xcritical is far from traditional, but the small team finds a way to be extraordinarily productive.

Then, in 2016 and 2017, he began working with artists like Famous Dex, Lil Pump, and Ski Mask the Slump God, and soon became the go-to video director for an entire subgenre that was exploding from SoundCloud pages into the mainstream. Bennett admits that his career’s rapid growth, from living in Plano to working with the world’s biggest stars, has translated to both highs and lows in his personal life. Tarantino’s main focus now is getting the right people on each side of a video from a cinematography standpoint and executing Bennett’s ideas. Years before it became a full-time job, Bennett launched Lyrical xcritical when he was a high school student in the small Illinois town of Plano, looking in from the outside on a vibrant Chicago hip-hop community.

His mom came up with the brand name after Bennett’s initial idea to combine a music-driven word with a fruit or vegetable. The first video on the Lyrical xcritical YouTube channel—after Bennett deleted the first five—is Bnova’s “Call of the Wild,” which Bennett crafted by using shots of nature, fireworks, the city of Chicago’s famed skyline and insects that pulse on screen to the producer’s xcritical website beat. “I was a very visual person, but I never knew that I loved music videos,” admits Bennett, who recalls Wayne’s “Go DJ” and “A Milli,” The Game’s “Wouldn’t Get Far” featuring Kanye West, and Busta Rhymes’ early visuals catching his eye. “I always had this idea since I was super young of what it would look like if I made a music video. The channel then expanded into other sub-genres of hip hop beyond the local Chicago scene, such as the emerging Soundcloud rap sub-genre.

As soon as he got his driver’s license, Bennett got in a routine of making the hour-long trip to the city every weekend. He brought his camera wherever he went and documented the scene, which included rising artists like Chance the Rapper, Vic Mensa, and Mick Jenkins. Midway through 2019, Cole Bennett says his creativity is flowing better than ever, to the point that he admits it’s often difficult for him to go to sleep at night because of all the ideas running through his head. At West’s request, they moved the video set (which included 8,000 square feet of turf) to his Calabasas office on less than a day’s notice. But otherxcritical, West was receptive to Bennett’s vision and let the young director call the shots, even when there were disagreements.