Layers Of Earth

So 10 years ago today, I started losing my eyesight.

This is kind of a weird thing to observe, as part of me is sad of course. Yet, there is this sense of time, and personal accomplishment.

Look. This wasn’t an easy decade. But in the end, I feel like I came out the other side of things stronger and better; resilient and capable of things unimaginable before my affliction.

So like I did a decade ago, I spent this December 19th watching “The Fellowship of the Ring.” When those first spiraling spots set in motion before my left eye, I wondered if I would ever be able to experience a motion picture in the same way again. Over that time, I had to adapt and learn how to observe things differently. I had to use other senses, trust my ears and instincts and let go of that which I could not control. But in the end, all this time later, I still love the scene at the edge of Khazad-dûm, when Gandalf yells, “You shall not pass!” I find the sound design epic beyond words. And I find Samwise Gamgee to be overtly bisexual at the very least.

When my eye failed (My left eye. My right eye was bad when I was born, so I was screwed.), I really worried about losing more than the ability to see. I worried about losing the ability to spell. To keep up with technology. I worried about forgetting how my kids looked. I worried about losing my sense of direction. I worried about my ability to follow my beloved motorsports. I mean, it was really scary. The first time I went to Disney with the family scared the living shit out of me. What happens if I lose them in the crowd? What do I do on a  roller coaster? Will I know what’s coming up around the next bend?

Well, I really didn’t need to worry TOO much. Spelling is an ingrained part of our lexicon, I’ve discovered, a part of our mental construct of language itself. Technology – oh my beloved technology – has changed in terms of portability and touch screens and such, but it also allows me to do things like type this blog with text to speech and magnification aids. I am still the family navigator, having guided The Zhen’s on vacations through intense metropolitan areas like New York and San Francisco without GPS, without a problem. And I use a cane in crowds so people understand that I am visually impaired, not drunk. All the while, adopting the philosophy of the ruder people are, the blinder I become… (whack! Sorry, was that your shin?)

I do miss driving. Even more than reading. I would give anything to feel the exhilaration of downshifting at speed. Not to mention the independence of being mobile…

My children have grown and I’ve watched their baseball games through a monocular magnifier, heard their wonderful concerts through undistracted ears and been blown away by the confidence and maturitty they’ve displayed in the face of their dad’s eye problems. I know it has been a hinderance from time to time, having to be my “eyes” (”How much time is left on the clock? What down is it?”), but I know it has given them a perspective, a sense of empathy, that couldn’t have been imparted by anecdote alone. They’ve lived it. And I think we’ve all been the better for it in some ways.

And then there’s my wife. My marriage. In the middle of life, here we were trucking along, raising a family and building a “normal” life. It would have been predictably easy for a family, for a marriage, to crumple under the pressure of this sort of thing. But my wife is a rock. Solid. Loyal, Unwavering in commitment to family and to me. I couldn’t have asked for anything better in life. I’ve made dumb decisions over the course of it all, but talking to the redhead was definitely not one of them. She is my light; my eyes.

I am beyond lucky.

Today, in 2011, I can still watch cars race and probably tell you who’s going to need a track bar adjustment at the next pit stop. I can still spell hippopotamus. I will get an iPad to record my next album remotely, at various South Florida locales.

I really never thought I would make it through the Mines of Moria. But here I am, at the base of Mt. Doom, still standing… awaiting my next adventure.

“If I can get 100 people to give a shit, I’m happy.”

This is the modest goal I have these days for my music. And sadly, it will take all kinds of sweat and arm-twisting to meet it.

It’s tough in this age of instant streaming downloads and YouTube videos to get people to part with their hard-earned cash to support any kind of music, much less the music made by a married suburban dad of two you’ve never heard of. It re-enforces the unkind truths about the artform’s place in the digital age, relegated to an ancillary role, fueling our workouts or our commutes at best, or perhaps soundtracking our video games or other primary entertainment sources. The idea of an “album” itself as a continual, themed collection of music designed to be listened to, in order, from start to finish has become something of a dinosaur, replaced by the selective gratification and financially frugal concept of the playlist. Not that there’s anything wrong with that I guess, but it’s a ways from how I grew up consuming music.

CONTRASTS IN CONSUMPTION
Never was this contrast more crystallized than when I picked up a record player and some records for the first time in over two decades. this happened about 6 months ago. I found a Zeppelin record and put it on. The spinning table was the central focus, the album cover in hand. No videos or life chores to take me away from the warm embrace of the analog tones and perfect imperfections of old vinyl.

But what occurred to me wasn’t so much the vinyl epifany, which is a blog onto itself. It was more that this form was what I fell in love with as a kid. Alone, you, the music and the artist. It could take you on a journey without a joystick or a steering wheel in hand. Perhaps this is why, in spite of all of the depressing realities facing the form as it pertains to me, I still love making and sharing my original music.

THE ESSENCE OF TIME
Even more pathetically, I write this blog with the knowledge that most people, friends even, won’t bother to read it. It’s where we are. I can post a pic of a cat doing something stupid or a status update about what I am eating for dinner and that is likely to get more of a response. Why? Those things are universal, uncontroversial and require little thought or effort to engage in. “Sure do love that Fajita Burrito at Chipotle,” they’ll retort. But ask people to listen to or read your creative enterprise and the likely response will be akin to digital crickets. And that’s not even asking them to PAY for anything – that’s just asking them to spend time.

This is my third album in 10 years. I think I have sold a grand total of 300 copies and probably given away another 100 or so. Now mind you, I don’t tour or play live shows, so there is something to be said about the challenge of trying to move units while sitting at home. I get that. But when I consider the time and level of effort involved, it is kind of crazy.

Seriously, consider what this product entails. I write the material, arrange it, play all the instruments for the most part, record it, engineer it (with all the associated learning curves), design all the artwork inside and out, build the supporting websites and stuff, all because I love the form.

Oh, and did I mention I am legally blind? LOL! Talk about a labor of love.

I long ago realized that I was never going to “make it” in the music business as an artist. What people need to understand about this music and me is that it isn’t some desperately pathetic middle-aged swing for the fences. I’m really, really not that delusional or sad. Please. But I would hope that I could conjure up enough support among my friends, close and extended, to justify the production of music in this form. That’s all I really want people to do. Listen. Maybe you’ll enjoy it. Maybe not. But at least listen. Maybe you’ll end up being one of the 100 who gives a shit…

(So if it ends up that you do in fact give a shit, visit www.GeorgeZhenMusic.com and order  George’s new CD, “In Transit”…)

I’ve had this blogspace here, Layers of Earth, for nearly 5 years now. Through the course of its existence, it has evolved a bit from the first attempts at chronicling my life as a static HTML page to the blog repository it is now. It has all these weird facets and obsessions in my life stored here, from motorsports to craft brew to flight simulation. It’s just my little space for threads of thought, nothing really more than that. That said, the hardest thing for me to establish here was a consistent page for my musical creations.

Well, that’s kinda solved now. Let me point you to GeorgeZhenMusic.com .

GeorgeZhenMusic.com is a separate website powered by Band Camp. What makes it really great from my standpoint is that it is a standalone entity which I can use to catalog and sell my tunes directly to my fans. No more wading through iTunes or CD Baby to find my music – All three of my albums are available there as physical CDs, digital downloads and full length streams. The pricing for these items at GeorgeZhenMusic.com is much cheaper than anywhere else on the internet – in fact, the digital stuff is half-price compared to iTunes. In addition, I was able to integrate the look and feel of my Layers of Earth blog over there as well, so it’s nice and continual in theme and feel.

I also have pointed the domain for Wild Iris Records to GeorgeZhenMusic.com as there isn’t much going on these days with my little makeshift label other than myself. Shawn Snyder is off to pursue his masters at NYU and Chorderoy has pretty much morphed into something else. There doesn’t seem to be much of a reason to keep a dedicated website for the label anymore.

So that’s it. If you feel like it, go over and check out GeorgeZhenMusic.com and let me know what you think. All of the “music” links on Layers of Earth point there now and I will be adding some exclusive digital only material in the coming weeks. And don’t forget to pre-order your copy of my latest album, “In Transit” while you’re visiting (shameless, I know, but I had to do it)!

Creatively, one can find inspiration in many forms. The muse is fleeting and unpredictable. When I was putting together the first tracks for the album that would eventually be entitled “In Transit”  back in 2009, there was no thematic thread to pull on. This runs in stark contrast to my previous release, “Dust of the American Pixel”, which had a firm theme and concept from gestation. The whole idea of “In Transit” really didn’t come together until I laid my half-eye upon the skin of a certain old aircraft baking in the sun.

A Flying Passion
Anyone who knows me knows I’m something of an aviation geek. This reaches back into my childhood when my dad would take me to the airport to watch planes. Bird watching of the mechanical kind. We would go to the big airports like Ft. Lauderdale International and MIA, but we would also frequent the smaller airports where the general aviation birds flock.

One of those airports was Opa Locka Airport in Dade County. Opa Locka (or, in aviation parlance, KOPF) was a former military airbase. When I was a kid, it housed the usual collection of Cessnas and Beechcrafts, but also was home to older airliners and war birds. It wasn’t uncommon to stumble upon an old WWII fighter like an F4U Corsair there, or a Mustang or something. Also it was something of a functional boneyard, with small freight outfits flying older prop airliners converted for cargo, ferrying materials to the neighboring islands. It is at KOPF that I fell in love with those big beautiful radial engines and their husky sound. These are memories imprinted on me like a brand from childhood. I’ve loved old birds and aviation in general ever since those days.

So it was something of a symmetrical moment last year when I stumbled upon a website dedicated to a beautifully restored Eastern Airlines DC-7 that just happened to be based at KOPF.

Tying It Together
One of the underlying themes I stumbled upon by accident when recording this record was the recurring mention of geographical places and modes of transport. Again, I didn’t plan on all these mentions of turnstiles and flights from Amsterdam to MIA, but there it was. Once I recognized this, I went about fashioning the last few songs with the theme of being “In Transit” in mind. So what is the visual theme here? I played around with an idea with using a bus, an old GM Fishbowl bus from the 1950s, as the artwork focus. But those are hard to find around here.So, enter the DC-7. Specifically, DC-7B N836D owned and operated by the Historical Flight Foundation. This baby had all the nostalgic look and feel I was looking for PLUS the added bonus of being located at KOPF. Talk about beautiful circumstances! A phone call to the number on the website put me in touch with Roger, who listened to my artist’s schpeel and kindly arranged access for me to photograph the aircraft for the album in exchange for a modest donation to their foundation. Quickly, I rounded up two dear friends, Nancy and Geoff, who are shutterbugs with different views, picked a date and prayed for good weather.

A Cold, Rainy February
We caravanned down to KOPF on a rainy, overcast Saturday last February and had an absolute blast. Here are some of the pics, and as you can see, the weather was actually artistically perfect. Dreary and cold. Nancy and Geoff have different backgrounds and look for different things which makes for a nice contrast.Also, as mentioned, this was all done in February. Talk about procrastination! No, not really. More like a matter of money and time to finish this project up properly But being on the cusp of releasing this thing, I hope this gives you guys a little glimpse into the process.

And of course, to Roger, Nancy and Geoff – a BIG “Thank You” for all the help and for being a part of “In Transit”…

GZ

(All Photographs fall under the copyright of Geoff Berygey and/or Nancy Goldwin. All  rights reserved.)