Singer turns artist despite being colour blind. The conversation with zoolon will goes number one, with the words of zoolan
When will all
the pieces
come together? And if I don’t like
the picture am I stuck
with it forever’,
a line from a song I
wrote when starting out.
The words stayed with
me. Kept me honest. A
mantra for the inspiration self-doubt hands
out when it feels like it.
I believe self-doubt is a
positive thing. Maybe
that sounds odd, but it’s
just the way I’m made .
Who am I? Since finishing at uni with a
1st in Music Technology (that proved to
be waste of creativity,
time and money) I’ve
gone by the alter ego
name ‘Zoolon’ but generally when people call
me ‘George’ they get a
response. I’m a singer/
songwriter and sound
artist without an ego,
preferring art above
glory; composition
over crowds. On balance I prefer animals
to humans. I’m a colour-blind Englishman
who loves France.
I
work alone, writing lyrics, composing melody,
performing and producing all my own stuff.
Also, I sometimes work
with poets and other
writers who want their
words set to song.
Having gone the generic teenage route of live
gigging playing lead
guitar in an average
band and figuring out
it wasn’t for me as the
politics of people were
a thing I could do without, I decided to invent
a version of me that
could make a music career without going
through the rituals of
performance. Hence the
birth of ‘Zoolon’ a couple of years back. I’m
not having a dig at performing artists by the
way. They have my total
respect.
The key stat that made
me look at the music industry differently was
reading one time that 1%
of artists draw in over
90% of the available income. That means most
musicians, however exceptionally talented they
might be, haven’t got a
chance. I just knew I had
to take a different path
to success. I’m not there
yet, but two years into the
‘Zoolon’ project I’m still
in business; still making
a good few quid.
I like to vary the genres I
work in from things as far
apart as classical music
at one end of the scale to
heavy metal at the other
and in between, ambient,
acoustic, folk, alternative
and experimental. This
variety is reflected in my
albums.
Take my recent
release, a five track EP
called ‘The Pigeons Are
Switzerland’ – a long story how that title came to
be I won’t bore you with.
The opening track ‘Tick
Tock’ is a song primarily
about violence. It’s followed by my reflective
tribute song ‘Francesca’
named after the sublime
American photographic
artist Francesca Woodman who committed
suicide in the winter of
1981, aged just 21. She
used to use herself as her
own artistic muse and
only found success after
her death. The tribute
continues with the instrumental ‘Eastside 1981’,
a eulogy without words.
‘What Remains’ is a
number about ‘life’ for
the main part. Lastly, the
title track, ‘The Pigeons
Are Switzerland’, echoes in sound the concept
of neutrality. Previously,
I’ve released two other
albums. ‘Dream Rescuer’ where I focused on an
acoustic theme with a few
electronic elements added in and not relying too
heavily on percussion to
help carry the songs and
‘Rainbows End’ where I
did add more percussive
and the electric guitar elements. ‘Dream Rescuer’
alone has sold on
every continent. As
of the now I am in
the process of composing an album of
electronic instrumentals, hopefully
for release shortly.
Fingers-crossed
on that one! Earlier this year my
book, ‘The Words
& Thoughts of a
Dyslexic Musician’ came into
being when I
s e l f - p u b l i s h e d .
Book reviews plus
responses on my
blog were good.
It’s seems readers
enjoyed and had
a laugh. That’s all
I wanted – a reaction. Growing up
I’d never realized
that I was dyslexic
and colour-blind
until the day came
when some professional bloke confirmed it. That they
were the reasons I
could barely read
or write and that
I only saw things
as black, grey or
white. It’s interesting being told you
are something you
never knew you
were.
So, here I am,
finishing off this
piece, sat here in
my attic studio on a
freezing cold English winter’s day.
Feels weird, in a
good way. I’d like
to thank the celebrated Lifoti Magazine for giving me
this unique opportunity.
You can found more about him on February 2019 Issue at here
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