Layers Of Earth

Last year when I released my Dust of the American Pixel concept album on CD, it was really a labor of love. But to be honest, by the time it came to built out the accompanying web site I was really burnt out on everything related to the project. My lackluster approach consisted of getting a domain and putting up a simple web page that had the primary elements all crammed into it; a link to buy the CD, a link to the video and a bit about the puzzle that is part of the project. I sold my 150 copies and pretty much let the thing fade.

Then, out of the Facebook universe a few weeks ago I reconnected with an old friend who now lives overseas. She’s an artist and we were catching up and I realized that I had nothing online that really conveyed the entirety of the Dust project. It would be cumbersome for me to just send her a physical CD, and frankly, I don’t know how relevant CDs are in terms of a media form anymore. So I challenged myself to come up with a format, a site, that had within it all of the artwork, lyrics and liner notes that one would typically find in a CD or a LP, and the results were pretty satisfying.

The relaunched pixelbomb.org website is really a self-contained version of Dust of the American Pixel. It’’s all there, lyrics, artwork, b-sides and everything else that embodies the work. And now, after a year of release I’ve also decided that it is time for me to release myself from the constraints of capitalized art: It’s all free. Every track is available for straight mp3 download. Of course, if you really WANT a physical CD you can still purchase one, but really everything is there for the taking, free of charge.

To me, Dust is a living project especially because of the puzzle. I will continue to produce supporting media for it, videos and animations and web sites for the puzzle. For me, it’s a great platform to mess around with new media forms. For instance, I am going to delve into Adobe AfterEffects because I have it, so in order to learn it I will do something for Dust. It can then be attached to the new website and thus the organic creation process lives on and on.

If you are curious, check it all out at http://www.PixelBomb.org .

The next challenge is for me to take this format and apply it to my first CD. It won’t have nearly the amount of content, but I want to preserve it online in a similar fashion.

Be well…

~g