Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lorin Drexler. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lorin, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?
I have been fortunate enough to earn a full-time living from my business and creative pursuits. Having said that, it’s been a long road, one that has endured its own set of pitfalls and doubts, especially in the beginning when you’re unsure how to do half the things you need to do. Though working for yourself has an unmatched sense of freedom and autonomy I’m unwilling to trade, regardless of the unending responsibilities of sole-proprietor upkeep.

I’ve always been a trial-and-error type of creative, stubborn, and unwilling to quit. I resonate with the Einstein quote, “you never fail until you stop trying.” I’m pretty obsessive, and though that approach could be categorized as dysfunctional, it’s worked. That drive gets things done. I think that’s a part of any journey that desires to push through to the other side. The universe wants to know you’re willing to struggle a bit before it hands you the key. What it doesn’t tell you is that the key has been in your pocket the whole time, you just got to keep digging for it.

I think having patience, faith, perspective, and persistence have helped. You must know what you’re going after and put the time in to go after it. The rest is out of your hands.

Lorin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Below is my third-person biography, found also on my website. It’ll give you a little background about me and my creative path:

Lorin Drexler (aka Loryn) is an American poet, musician, songwriter, performer, music producer, teaching/coaching artist, and novelist. Rooted in the windy city of Chicago and currently residing in Mesa, Arizona, he has worked and lived in various US cities coast to coast. Experimental in nature, provocative in metaphor, and mellifluous in sound, art truly is the ritual of his practices.

Writing freelance poetry at the age of 15 began the footwork of his projections and aspirations to create sound. Having an interest in lyrical poetry, his desire progressed to songwriting and learning guitar. At 18, Lorin formed his transitory first band, The Screaming Poets. Shortly after, while attending Columbia College Chicago for creative writing, he organized another project called Satori. This group featured an accoutrement of musicians and styles over the course of its existence. From indie-folk to punkish hard rock to downtempo electronica, it was its own versatile caravan.

Post-Satori and a plethora of songs later, his interest in the world of engineering and electronic music production began while working with a friend producer/DJ. He became acquainted with various elements of music software and hardware and started building his production suite. The electronica artist Loryn (www.loryn.net) was born within this process. Over the years, this method of designing music developed into a unique cohesion of computer production with organic guitar songwriting.

Furthering his advancement in the technological arts, Lorin attended SAE Institute located in New York City and graduated at the top of his class. After completing the program, he continued on his path as a music artist, writing, performing, and publishing four original studio albums and one single.

Under Loryn, in 2011, he began releasing monthly newsletters to his fans and subscribers. In addition to artist updates, his passion for writing crept in and became part of the newsletters. In 2015, he compiled the newsletters into a novel anthology of poetry, prose, and flash fiction called Re-edit (available now on Amazon: www.amazon.com/author/lorindrexler). Shortly after this, he began receiving publication for his work as well as being inducted into Poets & Writers, which is the nation’s largest nonprofit organization serving creative writers: www.pw.org/content/lorin_drexler.

Continuing on his creative journey, while freelancing as a music teacher and music producer on the Big Island of Hawaii in 2017, Lorin began developing a blog website (thanks to a few conversations with a friend/drummer/business coach in a band he was producing). He decided to name his blog Gen Society (www.gensociety.com) based on a series of synchronous experiences affiliated with a novel he has in the works called Genesis. After many trials trying to figure out what to do with Gen Society, resorting to his first love, Lorin finally settled on it being an art space blog for visual art & poetry collaborations.

Most recently, after moving in 2018 to the Mesa Artspace Lofts in Mesa, Arizona, Lorin has been offering teachings of his creative skillsets independently through his business and through a series of classes and workshops at various institutions in Arizona. To name a few, he has been working with the Mesa Arts Center, Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at ASU, Edna Vihel Arts Center, North Valley Regional Library, Bookmans Entertainment Exchange, Arizona Empowerment Scholarship Program, Arizona Friends of Foster Children Foundation, and Music & Arts.

As a performer, Loryn has played alongside artists such as Local H and Rusted Root frontman, Michael Glabicki. He has played multiple music festivals and parades, venues like the extravagant Art Institute of Chicago and the Double Door, and worked with avant-garde theatre giants, Collaboraction, as outsourced musical talent. As a music producer, Loryn has released four studio albums and one single, all currently distributed worldwide. In addition to his repertoire as a music artist, Lorin has produced other artists such as Chase Makai from Nahko and Medicine for the People, Ammon & Lia out of Utah, and the Beach Road Band in Hawaii. As a poet & fiction writer, Lorin’s work has appeared in tNY Press, LitroNY, Vine Leaves Literary Journal, Apocrypha and Abstractions, Maudlin House, and others. Lorin was also an awarded recipient in the 2019 Tempe Writing Contest.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
My overarching goal as an artist, which ties into many attributes of my business, is to share my voice and my words. Even with music, I entered that world to explore lyrical poetry through songwriting. I have something important to say and it needs to be written. About my life, our human life, spirituality, and love. As humanity continues to disengage from some of these thematic fundamentals, my perspective and focus continues to grow. Poetry is the driving force behind everything I do. It’s my vehicle for truth… at least the one I find most relevant.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

A lot of the time we think we’re more in control of what we do and who we are than is actually true. Recognizing what you want from life is more vital than choosing what you want to do. In the greater fold, we are chosen and have to trust that what we’re chosen for is what God, or the Universe, or whatever it is you may believe, wants for us, and we’re designed in the eye of that beholder to perform that mission, however large or small.

My resilience comes from the fact that maybe I don’t have all the answers, and maybe there aren’t any answers out there anyway. So being able to recognize what is presented before you, what life has given you, and allowing that to become your reality, is more imperative than trying to figure it out on your own. That moment happens naturally. For me, putting on those shoes and leaving them on happened in two instances in my life. The first was when I was in 2nd grade. I wrote a short book with a friend, who created illustrations for my story. At the time, I was completely unaware of the impact that moment would have on my life, but it did. The second was watching a neighbor sing and play guitar when I was 17. I was inspired and wanted to do that myself. My life snowballed from there.

Once I discovered what life was presenting to me and I recognized how that made me feel, I knew I had a purpose. Though the real grit is defined by the struggles endured along the way. They always make you question if you’re on the right path, and there’s never a straight answer to that. At some point, it’ll put you at a crossroads, and that’s the most crucial moment in any journey where you have to pick up and keep moving forward.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://lorindrexler.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lorindrexler/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lorinwdrexler

Image Credits
Moonhouse Productions