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

Roxana, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

My primary mission has always been to create meaningful stories. Of course, whether something feels meaningful or not depends on one’s perspective. I often encounter a significant push towards what seem like two polar opposite approaches—to be considered meaningful, art either has to be commercially successful or socially charged and often provocative. I prefer to focus on stories that are aesthetically complex but at their core, concentrate on universal themes such as love, friendship, loss, and resilience, making each project both a creative endeavor and a profound exploration of life.

At the core of it all is GloomyVerse™—a universe that isn’t merely a collection of songs and stories, but rather a meticulously crafted world designed to offer an escape from the mundane, igniting the imagination of my audience through mysteries and countless easter eggs, inviting them to join the ranks of my devoted GloomyVerse™ detectives (the name of my online community).

What does GloomyVerse™ encompass?

– A collection of musical stories set in limbo-like snow-globe worlds where stories play out in perpetuity, including my most recent original song, conveniently called “GloomyVerse,” which features over 100 orchestral tracks and about the same number of vocal/choir tracks that I personally recorded. It is full of thematic references and unexpected turns—a crazy, nerdy experiment in musical storytelling.

– Numerous story-driven music videos for my songs, infused with dark Victorian aesthetics. These were filmed on unique sets in the heart of Hollywood with professional theatrical actors and crew members, all based on scripts I wrote and featuring many hand-made props that I created.

– My new online store, TheGloomyVerse.com, where my fans can come a bit closer to the characters, relics, locations, and other elements of GloomyVerse™ through quirky and moody art brought into our world through stickers and postcards that I handcraft one at a time for each order.

– One of the most exciting and ambitious projects that I’ve ever dared to dive into—my debut novel set within this fantasy realm that I’ve been meticulously crafting for the past few years. It tells the stories of my shadow monsters and many other inhabitants of the GloomyVerse™ and explores the dreadful mysteries hidden within it.

Looking back on these experiences, I am also seriously considering diving deeper into the realm of script-writing and film production, partially because I feel much more comfortable behind the camera than in front of it, and also because I have another crazy dream, which is to create an anthology of short films exploring dark and macabre motifs from classic gothic fairy tales. But that might be a discussion for another time.

Roxana, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m Roxana Line, an award-winning composer and storyteller, crafting peculiar worlds through musical, visual, and literary art forms. Being self-taught, I’ve developed a unique sound and art style that blends dark aesthetics with a whimsical twist, forming the core of what I call GloomyVerse™.

What sets me apart is my storytelling approach across various mediums—music, art, videos, short stories, or a fully-fledged novel that I am currently 30,000+ words into writing. My creations serve not only to entertain but also to offer a meaningful refuge, presenting a quirky world filled with unusual creatures while deeply resonating with human emotions and timeless principles. I pride myself on how my works interconnect within GloomyVerse™, forming a puzzle that invites exploration and discovery with each release. My mission is to create a world that my fans can interact with and feel a part of… because in the end, they are, and that’s what makes it meaningful.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I grew up believing that unique ideas and polished creative thoughts would surely get noticed in the industry. In reality, this often serves only as a baseline requirement, and much more work is needed on top of that for anyone to start paying real attention to what you are doing. Uniqueness is not given the same importance as marketability. Creating something that can be instantly recognizable and ‘comfortable’ for the general audience, while still just different enough to be relevant and interesting, is often a good spot to be. Being ‘unique’ just for the sake of uniqueness will rarely lead you anywhere.

Another misconception I had growing up was that being a multi-skilled Jack of all trades was something to aspire to, as it would surely increase my usefulness and therefore my potential for success in my career. The reality is nearly the opposite; the industry favors specialists adept at teamwork and collaboration. Having diverse skills can indeed be very useful if you choose to work on a very small team or do everything alone as an indie creator. However, if working in a creative field at a high level is your goal, hyper-focusing on a narrow set of skills with a high priority for efficiency might just be the way to go. Oh, and prepare to make lots of coffee, while putting your ambitious projects on the shelf for a small chance of breaking through and getting back to them eventually. Needless to say, I went the indie route, as I have too many ambitious projects for the limited shelf space already occupied by hundreds of books in my studio, and, well, my lattes are too good to be making them for anyone else, haha.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

It’s essential to recognize that there are no “non-creatives”; creativity is the foundation of nearly every field and activity, requiring ingenuity and individual thought. That said, I know a lot of people have a hard time wrapping their heads around the idea of investing thousands of hours into what are often financially unsuccessful projects just for the one-in-a-million chance that someday your creations will reach the minds and hearts of the right audience. But for me, it’s a bit different; in my mind, I have the responsibility to allow my characters to meet this world, for if I don’t, nobody else will.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.roxanaline.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/roxanalinemusic
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/cJ4q6LnBJwGHy8zj/?mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/RoxanaLine
• Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/0e6wdB3lSwz4dKUKexdvdO?si=JhxetaS6Re-U1b9xj3ZKyA Online store: https://TheGloomyVerse.com/

Image Credits
Matt Burke, Cody Ward, Alexander Verbitskiy, Denis Rudchenko, Jossue Mendoza, Roxana Line