“I’m a believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.” ~ Thomas Jefferson
It’s no secret that the music industry has seen a lot of changes over the years with illegal downloading and social media. There have been “stars” made overnight, who faded away just as quickly as the public’s attention span. Regardless of all those changes, true talent always manages to rise to the top, take its shoes off and stay for a while, but it takes a lot of hard work to stand out from the pack and not become a “one hit wonder” and then “yesterday’s news.” That brings us to my latest interview with a Tennessee-based band called Roses Unread who is not the least bit afraid of rolling their sleeves up and battling in the trenches to get their music to the next level.
The band consists of Allison Teague Purifoy (vocals), John Purifoy (guitar), Blake Benton (guitar), Brant Sollis (bass) and Justin 
“Caveman” Hester (drums). They’ve been managing the delicate balancing act of pulling double-duty maintaining “real jobs” while chasing their musical dreams during every other spare moment since 2007. Their unique blend of meaningful lyrics, solid and original riffs, passionate vocals and top-notch musicianship have earned them a loyal following of impressive numbers.
For their stamina, their charisma, their sound, and their never-ending drive to make it to the top of food chain in the music industry, we are ecstatic to name Roses Unread as our Indie Band of the Week! Their lead vocalist Allison and I recently sat down to talk shop.
Hey Allison, it’s a treat to finally get to talk to you. I have to start off by saying that your new self-titled album has been on repeat in my player and I absolutely love it. Now, how about we dig a little deeper and tell our readers more about that band?
Thank you so much, I’m glad you like! We’re really proud of it, so we appreciate the positive feedback.
You should be proud as this seems to be the catalyst you’ve been waiting on, and it’s really pushing the band forward; getting praise from both critics and fans alike. What do you think you may have tapped into this time out to do that?
I think this album is heavier than anything we’ve done in the past. We’ve changed a few members since our first album The Commencement came out in 2012. Now, we seem to feed off of each other and we really didn’t do that in the past. We’ve also matured a lot since then as well. I think I’ve grown as a vocalist and I’m stronger and more powerful. I’ve never taken any kind of lessons, so it’s been a natural progression for me.
Do you also write most of the lyrics?
Yes, I started out as a poet when I was about 12 years old. I would have notebooks that I would fill-up all the pages, front and back, with poetry and I still do that. The ideas have really been flowing lately; it’s kind of crazy!
Do you have any idea why that’s been happening?
Well, we changed the tuning on our guitars from drop C to A sharp and it seems to have opened so many opportunities. All of these ideas seem to be coming from everywhere, but I’m not complaining at all!
You have to love it when the creative juices are flowing like that! So, you then pull from that poetry that you have in your books to come up with song lyrics?
There are a lot of different ways that the songs come together. John (Purifoy) may come up with a riff that’s really good and then I will go to one of my poetry books to see if I can find something that fits well with it. Blake (Becton) actually came up with the chorus on “Set Me Free.” He brought in this very catchy melody on guitar and it was perfect for that song. He also does back-up vocals with me, which is the first time that I’ve had someone be able to do that. Our voices really fit together well, but I have to be careful not to use it too much so that it doesn’t become overkill.
Who would you cite as being influential on you as an artist and the band’s sound?
The entire band loves Sevendust and that’s one band that we can all agree on, especially when we’re travelling and need to pop some music in. I love Lacuna Coil and Cristina Scabbia; I think she is incredibly sexy and manages to be that way without wearing revealing clothes. I’m a school teacher myself, so I can’t flaunt it onstage, so I love how she does that. Blake loves Breaking Benjamin, Metallica and Chevelle and I think you can hear some of that in his playing.
I saw on your press release that you’re going out on a small tour soon out West. That has to be pretty exciting for you!
Yeah, we usually just tour here in Tennessee and our border states, but this will be a new experience. Blake said that we should tour soon and this is actually the first time that all of the members could do it, so I’m very excited. We’re doing a mini-tour of nine shows towards Texas on our spring break. We pretty much booked it on our own. I probably reached out to 700 people by email and phone calls and not too many responded. It wasn’t easy, but I refused to give up.
You guys have pretty much been doing all of this yourselves for quite a while now, haven’t you?
You’re right and we’ve come quite a long way by doing it on our own. We still use the grass roots approach a lot because that personal contact can make a big difference. We get out and pass out flyers, plus we use social media a lot as well. We definitely have a hands on approach to everything that we do.
I think that’s awesome that you promote your shows like that because a lot of venues think that “if we book it, they will come” and that’s not always the case.
You’re right; you can’t just take it for granted that people are going to show up. We drove all the way to Alabama to do a show and there were only two people there to watch us. We found out that the venue did no promoting for the show. That’s when we decided that we have to try something different and we started plastering places with flyers for our shows until we get caught and were told to stop (laughs). I will say that our radio station here does help us out a lot, but you can’t just sit back and wait for the help, you really have to go after it.
For those who may not know, your husband John plays guitar for the band. I always find it very interesting when a husband and wife play together. What kind of dynamics do you think that brings to the band?
To me, I think it’s a pretty cool thing. I see so many other married couples who are fighting over what time the other is coming home (laughs). I think we push each other creatively and we definitely argue creatively. I don’t think that I could do this without him; it definitely has made our marriage stronger. We don’t have any kids together, so this band has become our kid.
Check out Roses Unread’s “Blind Lead the Blind:
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One last question before we wrap this up. What were three albums that influenced you as an artist?
Animosity by Sevendust taught me that you can still be as raw as you want to be and get away with it. That album was their least polished album and it taught me to be yourself. Opaline by Dishwalla was a very honest album and had some great songwriting on it. Issues by Korn got me into being in a band because I wanted to be the female Jonathan Davis. All three of those albums really impacted my songwriting.
Allison, I do appreciate you taking the time to talk to me today. I wish you the best of luck on your mini-tour and I’ll let you sign-off with anything you’d like to say to your fans.
Thank you for wanting to talk to me Johnny and we appreciate the support from Rock Revolt. Thanks to all of our fans for your love and support! If you haven’t already checked out our newest album, we hope that you will on iTunes (link below). If watch the video for “Blind Lead The Blind” on YouTube then please give it a “like” or share. Call your local radio/college stations or 1-888-3-OCTANE or tweet @SXMOctane and let them know you want to hear “Blind Lead the Blind” by Roses Unread…it would help us out!! We hope to see you all of you out on the road real soon!
