Pop artist Sereena premieres her debut music video today for her single You Love Me. Check out the fantastic video below. We also had the opportunity to interview Sereena about the making of her video!
Official Press Release:
NASHVILLE, Tenn. – (29 Aug 2018) — If you’ve ever felt like you could never connect in relationships, R&B/Pop artist, SEREENA, does an excellent job at capturing the feeling of being the constant outcast. Her debut single, You Love Me, triggers unknown emotions that may have been suppressed. Her music video will release August 31 to complement the debut.
The music video was recorded to make the listener hear the song from a different perspective. Sereena’s constant struggle to accept love is not only just with her significant other, but also with her grandmother, brothers, friends and other family members as portrayed in the video.
The three-and-a-half minute music video took over three weeks to record and produce. Adam Dobkin was the talented videographer that caught all the scenes and put Sereena and her team’s vision together. Manager and creative director, Emily Winters, directed each scene from start to finish making sure everyone stayed on task and on point with the concept. Wardrobe supervisor and creative contributor, Cayenne Walters, made sure all outfits were in conjunction with the theme and helped to create the concept of the video.
Other contributors include Brittany Athanase, Logan Stroud, Spencer Grady, Friday James, Nana and Bootlegger’s Inn. The team is eager to share this piece of art with everyone and looks forward to all the feedback.
I recently interviewed Sereena via email about her new music video from concept to production.
What is the concept of the video for your song “You Love Me”?
I have trouble accepting love from not only a significant other but also from friends and family. Listening to the song one would think I’m just talking about my boyfriend. The music video is meant to give the listener a new perspective. There are scenes of my grandma telling me she loves me and you’ll see me get uncomfortable hearing those words. There isn’t really a happy ending to the song or the video – I guess you could say the happy ending is me realizing my personal issue with emotions.
How did you come up with the concept?
My friends and I were hanging out in my little apartment talking about my recent issues with relationships and substance abuse. I was explaining to them that I kept abusing my heart and mind because I felt like I wasn’t worthy of anything good. They were also talking about their problems and it was like we all had the idea at once. I’ll never forget my friend Cayenne saying, “Get a pen and start writing all of this down!” I had a realization about myself that day. I had no idea that I felt I wasn’t worthy of love until I was actually expressing my emotions out loud to them.
It was like it hit me all at once and that’s where the concept of the video came from. I learned something more about my mind and I’m hoping that at least one person watching will be inspired about themselves too.
Explain your involvement in the creation of the video.
I worked with two of my friends on writing out the scene by scene. Our videographer was helpful with movements and what expressions I should be doing, but the entire video was scripted out by me and my two friends, Emily and Cayenne. We decided on locations, times and wardrobe. I was super nervous the first day of the shoot. I had no idea what to expect and the fact that everyone would be looking at me, gave me a small dose of anxiety- you get used to the attention though, I suppose.
After the third day of shooting, our videographer, Adam Dobkin (who is amazing and super talented), did all the tedious, hard work. He put all the scenes together and made our vision come to life. He did a perfect job at portraying what I wanted the song to say.
You filmed the video in the heart of Nashville to capture the urban and country contrast accentuated in your R&B/pop sound. What places did you film? How did they meet these criteria?
So Nashville is a beautiful city. I have lived here for four years now. It has been filled with ups and downs dealing with emotions, heartache, and finances. Nashville is not just a country music city. There are all sorts of genres being created here so I wanted to try and show that with some of the scenes.
We recorded most of the shots in an eclectic part of town called Germantown. It is located just behind the main tourist area of town. Lots of small coffee shops, art galleries, breweries, local restaurants and yoga studios – nothing country about it…lol. The scenes of Spencer (the boyfriend) and I are all shot in Germantown.
The scenes of me in the shirt showing my shoulders were shot in Antioch, which is about 20 minutes away from downtown. There are more open spaces without concrete buildings and sidewalks that you can come across. I wanted to have some shots of me outside in nature to catch that organic feel.
I feel like those shots even out all the city scenes throughout the video.
The last location we chose was a bar called Bootleggers Inn located in downtown Nashville. You’ll see this scene during the bridge of the song where I’m sitting by myself sipping on a drink. There are TONS of bars to choose from but this bar is authentic to Nashville in that it hasn’t been renovated or tore down, outside of all the other bars getting upgraded with fancy sushi bars, $14 cocktails and the owners slapping some famous country singer’s name on them (I’m not bitter-haha). Bootleggers gave us that down-home, cozy feel that wasn’t a rave but also wasn’t a dive bar.
Who is the love interest in your video?
There are three people in the video that express their love to me- they are the older woman that plays my grandma (she’s actually my friend’s grandma), Spencer who plays my boyfriend and Cayenne who is briefly shown during the bar scene. All three of these people are showing their love to me that I can’t accept throughout the entire video. The whole point of the video is to explain that I can’t accept love from anyone because the problem stems from deep within me.
When I don’t love myself, it’s hard to believe that someone else will love me.
What equipment did the videographer Adam Dobkin use to film the video?
He used a Canon 80D with 35mm f/2. He’s awesome.
What do you want people to come away with after watching the video?
I hope people will be inspired. I hope it makes them think. I want people to be like, “Oh, wait. That’s what she was talking about? It’s not just her boyfriend that she’s struggling with?”
I still struggle with accepting love from others. It took me all summer to even realize and accept that the higher power I believed in my whole life loves me. I always thought God was punishing me with every bad thing I did. When I finally realized His love, things started to get easier for me. My relationships started to get better because I was starting to love myself more. When you love yourself, you let others around you love you as well.
It’s a beautiful thing. I’m still learning and walking on this journey and some days are harder than others.
My mind can be my worst enemy. When I was writing this song, I didn’t even realize what I was saying. I initially wrote this in the perspective of me having troubles with a boyfriend, but the more I learned and dug deep into my thoughts, the more I realized this negative concept I had about myself. Maybe people will relate and maybe they will want to unlock what’s been haunting them deep down too.
Be sure to follow Sereena on social media:
Instagram: @sereenasounds
Facebook: sereenasounds