YOKO³
/
Spontan - artist drifting on a boat, lyric video
Journal · Music / Direction

Spontan

28M+ Views
Project
Spontan
lyric video
Client
Michał Szczygieł
Universal
Role
Direction
Year
2020
Result
28M+ views

Everyone waits for the perfect plan. And that is exactly why most things never get made.

Origin

The idea grows so long that it just stays in your head, for good. Perfect, and never done. We did the opposite. Better done than perfect.

It was 2020. COVID took the concerts, the shows, the live rooms. The artist's last big track was two years back. You could see what was pressing on him: stay the artist of one hit, or release another and take the risk. And the truth nobody says out loud was that the waiting could bury him. A good moment does not last forever.

The song is called Spontan, something spontaneous, something unplanned. So we made a decision that fit the moment. Truly spontaneous. No three-page plan, no back and forth, no safety net. We wanted to feel the track, feel the moment, and move with it, the way the song itself says it:

I keep fear awayThen I let the wind take meSo it can carry meI like to be spontaneous
Michał Szczygieł, "Spontan"

That is not our usual way of working. But in this case, it had to happen like this.

Kickstart

Nobody hired us. No commission, no contract, no money on the table. But we sat down with the artist and felt exactly the same thing. It is summer. The track is summer. Putting it off wastes both.

We went in with everything we had.

And here is the heart of it: the whole process was spontaneous, not just the video. How we made decisions, how we shot, how we carried the track and the picture side by side, in the same rhythm. We were not illustrating a finished song. We were pushing it forward together with the artist.

The real risk was never the budget. The budget was minimal. The risk was our reputation. But we decided together: we are doing this. We trusted the label would take it (they wanted a video anyway, the when was just not set), and if not, we lose the work and that is that. We made the whole thing before anyone said yes. Or rather, we did our part while the talks went on in the background, with no green light. A strange feeling. Uncertainty and freedom at once, but again, that is what the song is about.

Spontan - frame 01
Spontan - frame 02
Spontan - frame 03
Spontan - frame 04
Spontan - frame 05

The idea came straight out of lockdown, because that is where we all were. No friends, no social life, no bars, no concerts. All you had left was what is inside you, and open space, though how open depended on each person. Ours was what it was. So one of the few things we planned was that single shot, the one meant to carry the whole track: the artist drifting on a small boat, the water turning into sky, and us alone with our thoughts and dreams in that space. And above him, something no one here sees: our drone, capturing the whole image. The artist grounded, but free. The lyrics woven into the frame. One image, the whole of that spontan.

From idea to release it took days. Not months. The rush was our fuel, not our obstacle.

While shooting, we caught extra material that later became the acoustic version on Universal. That one was not our idea, so we left it under their name. No hard feelings, but since it was not our intention, there was no reason to sign it as ours. On our side we treat that material as a making of.

Outcome

It came out in 2020. Today, in 2026, the piece has over 28 million views. A radio hit. Played on music TV. For a Polish lyric video, those are results few ever reach.

But it was never about the numbers. It is about what one decision can change when you stop waiting. Better done than perfect, made exactly when hesitation would have killed it.

The label was glad, and the reason matters: they did not find us, we found the artist, and we listened to what he needed. We saw the problem, but there was potential too, and that is why we genuinely cared about solving it. It was never about the job alone. We decided we could put our skills in and do as much as we could for the artist. We brought the idea, solved the problem, and helped Michał find himself again in that strange time. Since then we have handled his whole visual side. Music videos, concerts, art direction. One spontaneous yes, years of work together.