indie music women artists

Cover art courtesy of Rose Cara Perry

Rose Cora Perry & The Truth Untold’s single, Not My Time, speaks to those who have been impacted both physically and psychologically by the pandemic over the past two years. Perry wrote the song after her own triumphant victory over the coronavirus. She declares in both the literal and metaphoric sense, that it is not her time to die.   

Perry & The Truth Untold released their debut EP in November 2019 with a planned first time tour in Europe. But they were forced on to hiatus like many other artists due to border restrictions and social distancing. Perry says this was a dark time for her. Not only being isolated from her loved ones, Perry was unable to achieve her artistic expression. She also suffered personal losses through the deaths of her only brother, a lifelong friend, and her beloved 17 year old Siamese cat.

The resilient Perry not only turns her sorrows into songs with a message of hope, she’s not shy about making statements through her relatable lyrics or thought-provoking music videos. Her Not My Time video is no exception. The story line “follows an FBI agent’s pursuit of the elusive Smoking Gunn, a controversial 1984-inspired conspiracy theorist whose mission it is to spread doubt, disruption and the questioning of authority figures.”  The growing diverseness created by opposing views on Covid inspired Perry to create a video that doesn’t take sides. Perry and the band want viewers to think for themselves, and understand that we all have our own “truth” to discover.

I recently interviewed Rose Cora Perry about the making of the Not My Time video including the story idea, costume design, videography, writing the script, juggling all of the creative hats behind the scenes, working with her band mates on set, and much more.

Where did you get the story idea of an FBI agent pursuing the “Smoking Gun” a person of interest, for the video?

As the song was inspired by the pandemic and written following my own personal battle with covid, we wanted to broach that same topic from a different perspective for the video.

Beyond how the virus itself has wreaked havoc on us socially, physically, and psychologically, so too has the divisive narrative between those “for” and “against” mandates… so much so that we have entirely lost sight of the fact that this has been a universal human experience that has affected us all.

The story line is meant to highlight that “us” vs “them” dialogue with the person of interest challenging the “authority” of the FBI.

Where was “Not My Time” filmed? Why did you pick that particular location?

We filmed the video in a variety of locations just outside of our hometown of London, Ontario – primarily around Aylmer and St. Thomas. We chose those locations as:

1. We didn’t want to disturb people with our shoot so aimed to film in lower-traffic areas where I could do burnouts with my Camaro. (We did spark some interest from local farmers as to what the heck we were doing though.)
2. We also wanted to go for “generic” country scenery which didn’t have a lot of street or highway signs making the locations feel more “generic”

Where did you film the rockin’ band performance with the cool light ambiance?  

The live performance scenes were actually filmed in the lower level of our loft. A set of flashing lights can go a long way as far as making a boring white room look pretty epic! Equally, the scene with the FBI analyst (played by our friend Ben James) working at the computer was shot in our loft itself on my actual computer. When you’ve got a limited budget, you just have to be more creative with your angles.

You’re credited as the screenwriter for the video. Tell us more about your experience writing the screenplay and if you have plans to write more.

Tyler, my drummer/partner and I have actually collaborated as far as coming up with storylines for all of our videos: I just flesh them out in full. It’s kinda similar to what happens when I write a new song for the band. I present the idea to him, and we then jam it out and play off of each other’s ideas until the arrangement is finalized.

I think in a past life I must have been a film director as I come up with very elaborate ideas and then have to think about how the hell we’re going to be able to pull them off on a shoestring budget.

The first couple of videos we made for this project were a good learning experience as it taught me how important it is to even have the kind of “shots” we want worked out in advance.

For “Not My Time”, I had it organized as to what scenes we would shoot on which days, what kind of extra angles we’d need for main scenes for the b-roll, and how the plot would develop once we got to the editing stage.

The cinematography made the story so compelling to watch.  

How did the opportunity come about to have Emanuel Benyamin as the cinematographer? Have you worked together before and if so, on what project(s)?

Emanuel (Eman for short) and I have known each other for probably about 20 years at this point, having met in the local music scene. Not only is he a gifted (and creative) videographer, but he’s also an incredibly talented photographer too.

He has been my go-to cinematographer for all of the videos we’ve released since 2016: “Away I Go”, “Six Feet Under”, “Empty”, “For What It’s Worth”, “Easy Prey”, “Rolling in the Deep” and most recently, “Not My Time”.

You wore a lot of hats for this production — director, screenwriter, wardrobe, styling, set design & props as well as the starring role. Explain what that experience was like for you. If there were any challenges, how did you overcome them?

I am fortunate enough to have both Tyler and Eman at my disposal as far as collaborating and finalizing our videos’ ultimate direction. While putting together our projects is a bit of a grueling process (several days of shooting followed by several weeks of editing side-by-side),

When I’m writing the screenplays, I think about what the characters would look like, the appropriate settings to film in for the theme and what props would be essential to the “action” of the plot. Directing is just bringing those concepts on paper to life.

The FBI jacket and computer screen were impressive. How were you able to replicate those to look so authentic? 

LOL! I’m glad you thought so. Conveniently the video was shot around Halloween which made access to FBI accessories quite easy.

As far as the secret to our stock footage, I stumbled across an amazing site called “Pond5” which has some very realistic-looking “surveillance” footage that blended well with our own shots once we adjusted for colour and lighting.

We had to green screen both Tyler’s FBI cell phone and Ben’s FBI computer to overlay the stock footage which added a bit more complication to the editing process but we’re quite pleased with the result.

Tell us how it was working with your bandmates as fellow actors in the video. Did you cast them in their parts, or did they volunteer?

I knew I wanted my character to disguise herself as a blonde (my polar opposite) and so was deliberate in asking our touring bassist Carmen North if she was willing to partake. It was a long day of filming hers and my swap scenes together but she was a trooper and did a fantastic job.

As for Tyler, he’s truly a natural actor and had the FBI in him down cold. The way he exited his vehicle and walked with such authority and purpose – that was all him.

The final character in the video was the FBI Analyst played by our pal Ben James. I had realized when we started to shoot that it wasn’t clear enough plot-wise how Tyler’s FBI detective remained “hot in pursuit” of me given the time lapse between when I had taken off in my Camaro and when he started to follow me in his SUV.

So, I came up with the idea of asking our friend Ben to play his coworker who is following my car through GPS tracking and surveillance tech. Ben jumped in last minute and again did a great job.

I still chuckle when I think of Eman, our videographer, directing Ben to “point at the screen” and “move the mouse” around to capture the “action shots” of that sequence.

What was your favorite part of the video shoot and why?

That’s a great question!

Eman was trying to direct me to stop at a specific juncture but of course, I couldn’t hear him as I’m driving toward the camera from 20 feet away. Because my Camaro is also so low to the ground, my ability to see where he placed his tripod as a marker of the “stop zone” was limited. While all of this was taking place, Carmen was out playing in a cornfield which was mildly distracting.

What would you like for audiences to feel after watching the video?

It goes without saying that we hope they enjoy the song but also hope they felt the video was captivating to watch. I mean, a good car chase is always entertaining. We hope too it inspires viewers/listeners to check out some of our other videos (and messages) as well.

You can follow Rose Cora Perry & The Truth Untold on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, & their Spotify Artist Page.

 

Watch Rose Cora Perry & The Truth Untold:  Not My Time: