I seldom talk about how proud I am of Zetalambmary. Its the product of what has been a very interesting journey. It started as a half-baked idea, and both Aloysius and I acknowledged that with a fair amount of humour. We couldn’t really find a suitable platform to express our opinions on what is predominantly a counterculture music genre, and simply decided to create our own. There was no real further ambition. It was hosted on blogspot, we gave it an utterly random name, and our initial attempts at publicity bordered on the ludicrous (we were both in the school journalism society back then and we shamelessly interviewed ourselves for an article in the school newsletter).
But somewhere along the way, we turned serious. We established contacts, locally and internationally, and now receive more promo material than we can possibly review. We attended gigs, and had the privilege to interact with bands face-to-face for interviews. Some even allowed us to have signed merchandise to use for promoting our site.
We created our début print edition, and made enough sales to break even. That coincided with an attempt to venture into the local metal scene, where we made a few mistakes and offended some important people in the community. We tried to make amends, failed and got backstabbed, and were forced to concede that the local scene was just too small for us to circumvent our haters and reach a different part of the market. Still, some PR work was successful, our magazines were on the shelves in a few stores, and we did make a coupla good friends along the way (not to mention owing a few favours from the many people who helped us). We’re not likely to go to print again, but this was certainly quite an experience.
Our dotcom incarnation has been up for less than a year and a half. Despite our lack of consistency in adding content, our viewership is healthy and we’ve garnered a small following. Its nothing to boast about, but looking back at when we’ve first started out, I think we’ve accomplished what we sought to do. Zetalambmary is a nicely comfortable place to express our views (some related to metal only by the thinnest of threads) to the few people who are interested. It has been with us as we’ve grown, first up then older, and its own evolution is indicative of that.
It has seen me through my own turbulent years, as I tried to quit being a juvenile delinquent of sorts, then struggled to come up with a proper vision and purpose in life, and now finally walking tentatively down a chosen path. It is the biggest tangible anchor rooting me to my musical tastes. It gave me an identity I have never lost throughout the myriad of obstacles, and that provided some measure of comfort.
What has made me most proud of Zetalambmary though, is that it crystallized my partner’s ambition. Since we began the site, I have seen Aloysius develop his own vision for the future, then working tirelessly towards it. He is only halfway through his university education in communication studies, where he has impressed me with his eagerness to learn, and yet he has already gathered up an impressive CV writing for all these different publications. Only time will tell if he’ll be successful, but being a music journalist is an indelible part of his life and at the beginning of it all, there was Zetalambmary. Being part of that is probably the most I can do for a friend.
There are times when I muse about whether I should have followed his path. It would have been much easier with the experience we’ve gained from Zetalmbmary. And if we had gone to university together, his presence might have helped me past my own struggles and maybe I’ll be doing alright too. Instead, I’m still struggling by myself now to get into law school, and my world watches to see just how far this ex-malefactor thinks he can go. But in any case every man chooses his own path, and either way I’ve made my choice and I’ll have to live with the consequences.
The choice to set up Zetalambmary though, despite not harbouring any intentions of truly being an authority on metal music, is one I will never regret. One day Aloy will outgrow the site as his own career develops, and that will be the end of that. But until then, I will continue to post what little I can.
Some would say I’ve been wayy behind the times, but I’ve just got twitter now as well. Its been set up predominantly to follow metal music news, but there’ll be other things as well. I have no idea who to follow, so if you’re a friend, leave a twit or something~
Softly Questioning 