Behind The Scenes: Trauma Party – Roll Up (It’s The New Truth) (Official Video)
“Nothing looks better on screen than burning pillars of rusted oil drums, busted and burnt-out carcasses of cars, and a post-punk band performing along to a song about the foreboding and imminent collapse of society,” says Solomon. “Mix in a little Stephen King horror Christine as the ute (pickup truck) headlights stare ominously behind drummer Kirsty Swanney, and you’ve already won the visual battle.”
Fortunately, Trauma Party didn't need to construct their own wasteland. The video was filmed around The Woolshed at the Waiheke Dirt Track, the band's rehearsal space and headquarters for the local derby racing community. Its gravel, rusted machinery and battered vehicles provided a ready-made car graveyard for Derek’s road-warrior vision, and a suitably barren setting in which to set 44-gallon drums ablaze while frontman Buddy Olson revelled in the role of a “demented circus ringmaster.”
Preparation began before dusk. Wood was gathered for the fires, equipment unloaded, and a sparse lighting setup assembled around the performance area. Under strobe and spotlights, the band added war paint and white baby powder before beginning their run-throughs as darkness settled over the dirt track. Passing traffic continued to move curiously through the background.
The island weather contributed something of its own. As temperatures dropped, heavy dew quickly coated the instruments and amplifiers with moisture, while Kirsty’s drum kit accumulated a mixture of dew and ash from the fires roaring around the band.
The aim was to capture the physical energy of Trauma Party’s live performance while bringing the band’s visual ideas and the song’s political message together in a single shoot. They repeatedly ran through the track until they had enough footage, but many of the individual and side shots were conceived spontaneously as the night progressed and the location suggested new possibilities.
One of the video’s most distinctive elements came courtesy of Swanney, who brought fire poi into the performance. A contemporary fire-spinning adaptation of traditional Māori poi, fire poi use weighted burning wicks on chains which are swung through the air, creating moving patterns of flame. Against the wrecked vehicles, smoke and darkness of the dirt track, they added a distinctly New Zealand element to the video.
They also produced one of the night’s unplanned moments. Bassist Ron K decided to try the fire poi himself, despite never having used them before. The resulting footage became what the band describes as a “happy accident”, one of several ideas that emerged simply from responding to the setting and seeing what worked in front of the camera.
From comparatively simple ingredients – old cars, rusted drums, headlights, fire, smoke and a cold night at the band’s rehearsal space – the shoot produced the heightened, chaotic visual world of the finished video. It proved a fitting conclusion to the series of four videos accompanying Because You’ve Been Good, while capturing the heavier direction Trauma Party are beginning to explore beyond the EP.
‘Roll Up (It’s the New Truth)’ closes that chapter, but not the band’s appetite for further video mayhem. Trauma Party head back into the studio in November to begin work on their first full-length album, with a local visual artist already booked to direct a video for one of the new tracks.
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