- The connection that was made was almost instant,
art and music happening right next to each other.
And I was in it, I was like tumbling down the rabbit hole
and nothing was going through my head.
Like an open connection, like a flow of freedom.
Everyone was hyper aware of what was going on.
And it changed me.
(upbeat rock music)
Art and music are the constant give and take,
the push and pull of my life.
Growing up I was always told, you can only choose one thing.
And I really, really loved art.
And art was my passion.
But, I also was a musician,
and music was a huge part of my upbringing.
But, still that idea, that lie was ingrained in me.
So, when it was time for me to make
a decision for college, I chose art.
I went to CalArts and was an animation student
knowing, 100%, that I was not going to animate.
Animation was that one format that I could
go to school for, that I was able to take everything.
Wow, I can act, I can direct,
I can create all these characters.
At the end of my second year at CalArts,
me and my parents knew that
there wasn't gonna be a third year.
I felt like I had learned all this information,
and I'd done so much, but I had done nothing.
There were so many sleepless nights when I was figuring out
what the hell I was gonna do with my life.
To have lost myself, to feel like I had failed completely.
That really opened up my pathway to
to just picking up a guitar, and to just sing.
I had found that in my art, I had put walls up
around myself, and I had really put myself into a box.
And I think that through music, it was such a release,
and there was no limitations or boundaries.
And it really became a cornerstone in my life.
(intense rock music)
For a long time, art was the focus in my life.
And through all that I found that there was
a piece of me that was missing.
And I went on to music, it was building,
and it was turning into something really amazing.
But still, there was something that I was trying to reach
and I just wasn't finding it just within myself.
And then I realized that I needed to do both, essentially.
I needed to make art and music a priority.
It's not a balancing act,
they need the same amount of attention.
And they need 100% of my attention, all of the time.
Looking back at that weird recital, in college,
those were my first and best example in my life
of where art and music had a perfect harmony.
It took me years after that moment to even realize
that that's even close to where I wanted to be.
And I had found it, early on.
I found it here at Sideshow,
and I also found it in my music.
And that harmony that I found, it was real.
My name is Zachariah Edward Montana Roane.
And I'm an artist that sings and a musician that draws.