The archive · Content & Film · Product decision · 2023–2024
Travis Scott's 'Sirens' builds a nine-floor Catalan human tower into its video
For Circus Maximus chapter 'Sirens', Travis Scott staged Catalonia's castell — a nine-floor human tower — with over 1,200 people shot over three days.
Travis Scott
What it had to solve
'Sirens' is a chapter of Travis Scott's larger project Circus Maximus. The video needed one central image big enough to carry Scott's utopian world, and the team found it in Catalonia, where the video was shot: the castell, a tower built purely from human bodies climbing on each other's shoulders.
How it works
'Sirens' is a chapter from Travis Scott's larger project Circus Maximus, and its video needed an image that could carry the rapper's utopian world. The solution came from a tradition of the place where it was shot: Catalonia's castell, a tower built by people standing on each other's shoulders.
The film centres on the construction of a nine-floor castell, a practice rooted in Catalan community life, re-staged inside Scott's utopian world. The production was colossal: more than 1,200 people took part, shot over more than three days in Spain.
By making a real communal ritual the centrepiece, the video gives a single artist's vision a scale that is physical rather than digital. D&AD recognised the work in its Music Videos awards for 2024; the archive page records no viewing figures.
Why it lands
- A castell is built by hundreds of ordinary people cooperating, so it makes Scott's 'utopia' visible as something a community constructs together.
- Shooting a real nine-floor human tower gave the film a physical spectacle no visual effect could replace.
- Anchoring the concept in Catalonia, where the video was shot, tied the fantasy to a place and its living tradition.
- Over 1,200 participants over three days meant the production itself mirrored the collective effort shown on screen.
What it did
The castell turns a solo star's fantasy into a collective physical spectacle: hundreds of bodies visibly carry each other to nine floors inside Scott's world. D&AD recognised the video in its Music Videos awards for 2024, and the work page records no view figures.
What you can take
When an idea needs scale, use a ritual that already produces it: a human tower built by a real community gives a fantasy sequence thousands of bodies and an authenticity no CGI crowd can fake.
Since then
Released during the 2023 rollout of Circus Maximus, the video was later recognised in D&AD's Music Videos awards for 2024. The archive page records no view counts, so the lasting artifact is the film itself: a rap video whose climax is a nine-floor tower raised by more than a thousand real people.
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