The Rolling Stones rock Sunset Blvd

The Rolling Stones' first new music video in 17 years is a homage to both the Stones' iconic career as well as the incredible, hand-painted billboards of Sunset Blvd.

Before the music video era there was a the billboard scene in LA when a few independent minds in the
music industry posted giant, temporary monuments to a variety of rock icons. These billboards have almost disappeared today, making way for more digitally-led promotions, but the locations have not changed. 

Directed by Francois Rousselet through Riff Raff, the promo features the Stones performing the new track, Angry, using archive footage from the band's live gigs, old videos and album iconography which is then transposed to a series of giant billboards along LA's famous street. Also starring in the video is actress Sydney Sweeney, star of HBO drama Euphoria and the first season of The White Lotus.

Rousselet designed all the 109 billboards, along with the team at Black Kite. “[This is a] music video idea that I’ve always wanted to make and kept closely guarded, waiting for a track like Angry to show up," said Rousselet. "And it’s the Rolling Stones for fuck's sake."

“As soon as Francois said, 'Don’t worry, it’s not that complicated to do'," said Matthew Fone EP/Owner at Riff Raff, "I knew it would be the total opposite, but when you have an idea so good, you put everything into it.”

“The lyrics of the track were matched to the footage using a combination of lip-syncing and AI," explained Black Kite's George Brunt. "We used 3D lighting to match the plates and replicate the quality and sheen of a classic billboard. The result had to look slick and working with different resolution types was challenging. The devil really is in the detail with this type of work, but it looks slick, and we love it.”