Some stories take decades to be properly heard. “Now Is Near” by Grumbeaux was written for a documentary following Tim Z. Hernandez’s extraordinary journey to uncover the identities of passengers killed in a 1948 plane crash that became, at the time, California’s worst aviation disaster. Newspapers reduced the victims to a single word, deportees, while their individual names, families and lives disappeared beneath the tragedy. Inspired by Woody Guthrie’s “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos),” later recorded by artists including Joan Baez, Johnny Cash and Bruce Springsteen, the story remained unfinished until Hernandez spent more than a decade tracking down the people behind those forgotten names.
Hernandez eventually documented their stories in All They Will Call You and They Call You Back, helping restore identities that history had flattened into statistics. Their names have since been read aloud at the California State Capitol, while a monument bearing them now stands at the Fresno mass grave. “Now Is Near” enters that long process of remembrance as something deeply human.
Buzzing, gritty guitars give the song a weathered edge, while soft, slow-paced drums move underneath with a restrained pulse. The music seems to carry the weight of time itself. Over it, Grumbeaux’s deep, thick voice rises with an agonizing emotionality, singing with soul and sorrow. His delivery makes the track feel intimate even against the enormity of its subject.
The song’s title takes on an especially poignant meaning here. After years of searching, waiting, and piecing together fragments of lives, the act of remembrance finally moves into the present. And with a feature film and documentary about Hernandez’s journey also in the works, this story continues to travel forward.
At the end of the day, “Now Is Near” is about bringing the forgotten into the now, and making sure they are finally remembered as people, not numbers.
STAY IN TOUCH:
FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | SPOTIFY | WEBSITE | YOUTUBE
Review by: Naomi Joan