Her style. Slug. The way she walk. Slug.

A higher plane. The moment I met Leksi Harris, I knew she was flying at a different altitude. Leks has this way about her that I can only summarize as “classic”. Her presence, her style, her personality. She is one to be remembered without even trying to be remembered. To me, Leks is the new modern classic, and a household name to come. Someone who puts in the work every single day. Who crosses the path of legends on her way to becoming one. I speak this confidently in Leks because she’s just that dope. The springtime rolled around and after many conversations about creating together, Leks and I realized it was time to cook. This is the story of Leksi Harris and Benjamin Smith meeting up one Sunday morning to walk, talk, and slug.

Closet Swamp (if ever needed).

I think there’s one person I could switch closets with and take on their whole wardrobe. That person would be Leks. I don’t judge a book by its cover. I don’t care what people wear. But personally, it is an exceptional way of expressing yourself. Just like words and phrases express thoughts, I believe colors and textures express feelings, whether that be by the way of a snap button on a varsity jacket or top thread stitching color, these little details communicate a lot. I know Leks thinks the same way when it comes to clothes, so I knew when shooting her Slug story, the fit would be cold.

Catch-Up, No Mustard.

I told Leksi to come meet at my house and to bring her keyboard, her midi, and her microphone to see if maybe we could find a way to combine her love for music and our love of style in a Slug Story. We planned on meeting in the early afternoon, but we woke up so excited, we decided to meet 3 hours early.

When Leksi arrived at my house, we realized we hadn’t seen each other in some time, so before we could go sluggin’, we had to chop it up. We sat down at my kitchen table and spoke about music, dreams, stories, work, style. I swear when I’m with Leks, I feel like I’m in a sitcom. She would be the ultimate 90s sitcom star, like Martin, but Leks. After talking and drinking way too much coffee on my part, I gathered the things to capture the Story and we were off. The concept of the shoot was to film Leks sluggin’ it from her home to the park to dock up right underneath a tree do what she does best: make classic music.

April Win(d)s

We took one nonstop shot from my house to the park. After a little bit of walking, getting into our flow, we started improvising: waving to people, smelling roses, running red lights. We were light and airy. We are being blown forward by the April winds. We arrived at these beautiful pink flowered trees, canopying a patch of overgrown green grass. We sat down with Leks resting her head on the back of the tree trunk.

Our plan was to create a song at the spot, but to be honest, we hadn’t finished our conversation from the kitchen table. We kept on talking, kept on laughing, kept on exploring the dimensions of lives and our minds, and most of all sharing stories. Leks had never known I had a sister Sarah (I think they would be good friends). I never knew that Leks used to travel back-and-forth to LA, Leks didn’t know I had been verbally assaulted by Leonardo DiCaprio on the streets of Little Italy.

Why We Do What We Do.

We didn’t end up writing or performing a song that day, but it was okay. We met up to work on Slug, but it was actually for us to chill. It made me realize that the real reason for doing Slug is to be able to have moments like this. To be able to do this for the rest of our lives. That’s why I’ll never compromise Slug for anything. If you start to compromise your love, then what do you have? Nothing. Thank you Leks and I’ll see you again at the spot soon.

Watch Next Slug Story

Leksi

A Classic.