Who is iamamiwhoami?

Because it's absolutely, inconceivably impossible that she might have produced it herself, you know, like Burial did?

I guess that's possible, but have you ever heard a Jonna Lee album? It's not a color she's ever painted with before (not even close).

I don't find it too much of a stretch to think that someone who could teach themself how to play piano or guitar could teach themself how to use Reason or Ableton.

People do change colours sometimes. And I'm speaking as someone who made the same leap.

You know I wasn't intimating that Lee could never conceivably make these songs herself, right? I'm just saying that the sound of them brings to mind the hallmarks of a few selected individuals (most of whom are men living in Scandinavia) who are not Jonna Lee. Also, two-person collaborations are what's in this year!

i think claes bjorklund is her main collaborator. he has done stuff that is slightly similar to this before so it wouldn't surprise me.

anyway, although there were some long periods of time when i didn't care at all and had essentially forgotten about it, this campaign did produce a handful of very special, arresting moments for me. if the goal was to introduce her to a far wider audience than she had before, she succeeded.

The music is really good but I find her Kate Bush mannerisms extremely annoying.

For those who (like myself) became preoccupied with other concerns, at midnight on November 16 "iamamiwhoami" or "bounty" or "to who it may concern" posted a nearly hour long video at http://towhomitmayconcern.cc/, pulled down after 3 hours. Its an open air "concert" comprised of a apparent single take (ala Russian Ark) from from night through dawn in the Swedish countryside. Versions are sometimes well removed from their earlier appearances, "O" in part 3 becomes more aggressive.

You can follow the breadcrumb trail from here. Tree humping included.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLQ3XMd2_10

She kinda needs to drop an album already. Seems like quite a few people's interest is already waning. Having only heard her music in the videos, I'm curious to know if the tracks will be compelling enough on an album, without the mesmerizing visuals. Don't get me wrong, everything I've heard is amazing, but will it still have the same pull and intrigue without the lush/weird/beautiful imagery accompanying it? I hope so.

After a break, she's back with this new (very good) one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLPxTKR7A70

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VduvB5xY2L0

still in love with this whole project.

;john is probably my favourite one out of the full single releases.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7zyF2QJ1BA
new song.

album is supposedly out in June.

A new song in under 2 weeks. I like it a bit more than sever:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hw0JmSRMXkY

Another installment prior to kin (audio-visual album on Cooperative Music, out June 11).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUSwkbu1IjU

These promo videos remain fun.

"Play" is the big ballad of the second set.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJBC8L3pG_Y

"In Due Order" goes more hard-edged sawtooth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AqU8FvTR3E

There's an album coming out soonish...
http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/68433236.html

I loved both Play & In Due Order!

The newest one, Idle Talk, isn't bad either.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2KxlzQMTpU

I've somehow missed all the hype building for iamamiwhoami but I just gave Kin a listen and it's a real album of the year contender. I need to go back and check some of her earlier singles. Think she's going to become my new obsession.

i loved the singles for a while but then fell off the hypetrain hard after she released a couple of duds. gonna have to give the album a listen.

listen to the bounty singles and search youtube for her concert (the hour-long one)!

I haven't bought Kin yet because I bought everything on it already the moment it went on iTunes and b)it's not out on CD yet, but it is very, very special.

think "clump" was her best track but she put it out after everybody stopped caring

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VduvB5xY2L0

I got really quite bored of the dribbling things out slowly and anonymously quite quickly, even though I had liked the initial dribbles.

But I gave the album a chance and it's definitely worth a listen - picks up towards the end, it's definitely one for the post-Knife thread (if we still had such a thing, why oh why can't we just grab threads from the Sandbox?)

It's funny, I occasionally find her voice a bit much (in a way I don't find Grimes' voice irritating because Grimes' voice is so obviously a theatrical reducto ad absurdum) when she goes into that quirky thing but not so much that it spoils the enjoyment for me.

"Play" (above), which I initially wrote off as plodding, is constructed just like a mid-period Cocteau Twins tune, and I haven't been able to get it out of my head for two weeks.

Dunno about album of the year, as The Knife announced a 2012 album release a while back, but I think Kin edge's out Niki & the Dove's Instinct and Purity Ring's Shrines in the artsy electro-pop debut category.

Wait, what's that about a new Knife album?

WHY DON'T I HAVE A KNIFE AND POST-KNIFE ARTY ELECTRONICA THREAD NO MOER?!?!?

That thread was on the sandbox.

Play is my highlight too, think this is my album of the year now. I do really like the Niki & The Dove album but this is so much better.

http://pitchfork.com/news/42307-the-knife-at-work-on-new-album/

Why would I read Pitchfork when I have ILX to summarise the salient bits for me? ;-)

(thanx for link tho)

Isn't much to the P4k link. You can also peer into the horse's mouth:

http://theknife.net/take-action-for-the-housing-rights-of-roma-in-rome

So this album is properly out now. It's without a doubt my favourite album of the year, probably the best thing I've heard since the third Portishead album. Wish it was getting a bit more attention.

Kill is my current favourite song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTnH3zs8wRo

RYM users rate Kin in the top 25 of 2012, and #1 under electropop and indie electronic genre tags, so global genre fandom is fairly aware of the album. ILM fans are limited to a subset of the usual suspects for this kind of music, so clearly my lobbying has been ineffective.

I was underwhelmed by the album, at first listen, but i'm looking forward to seeing her at Ether next month.

Yeah I saw it had really good reviews on RYM. It seems to have been getting some decent reviews in the music press too. I guess I was hoping it would take off on here a bit more, especially with The Knife/Fever Ray being so popular. Maybe I'll just keep bumping this thread until people take notice.

I listen to every new song of hers hoping it'll distinguish itself, and so far, to my ears, she hasn't done anything musically that'd put in the same league as "the usual suspects". But I always have time for a new iamamiwhoami song.

I really like the album.

As I mentioned earlier in the thread I missed all the early hype for her when she was putting out those early singles, the first time I heard her was when I listened to Kin all the way through. I can imagine some people got bored of waiting for the album or just her whole campaign but for me it reminded me of hearing Silent Shout for the first time or Black Cherry, I just fell in love straight away.

Owen, Play is the song that really stood out for me. If you know it already then I can't really think of any others of hers that would change your mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJBC8L3pG_Y

After a second and third listen, i actually like the album even less than i did the first time. It's a shame because i like her aesthetic. There's nothing on there to match 't'.

Anyone seeing her in London this evening?

Yes! Looking forward to it a lot.

So good! I'll have to give the album another go. Live, she's fantastic.

Absolutely fantastic. After nearly three years of following her mostly erratic output, it was a massive buildup that could have flopped - but didn't. Unreal. I nearly, nearly, nearly shed a tear when she did Y. Incredible.

'kin' is a pretty incredible album, feel like it's massively slept-on. it's reminiscent of how austra was vv similar to the knife in ways that were pretty good but just made me want to listen to 'silent shout', except this is similar in ways that make me want to keep listening to 'kin'.

Agree that this has been slept on massively, I've not seen it on one end of year critics list. I'll be voting for it in the ILM poll for sure, no album has come close to it this year.

For the people who still like to own actual CD's they've recently announced they're releasing Bounty in March.

http://towhomitmayconcern.cc/releases/iamamiwhoami-bounty

^ neat

I really like this album. For me, this and chairlift destroy the rest of the competition when it comes to catchy synthy Knifey styles this year

Playing in London again in May.

Couldn't agree more, it's excellent! Varied but still cohesive.
Grimes gets all the attention, and I wouldn't say this destroys her, but it is just as good.

this year's gazelle twin in terms of quality and unfortunate underappreciation imo.

Playing a date in the US...in Oakland. https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10151715593939336&id=270417754335

http://symbiosisgathering.com/lineup/

http://www.popjustice.com/videos/iamamiwhoami-fountain/123717/

That's a good one.

I'm usually a big fan, but this is a bit too Sarah Brightman for me, I don't know...

^ It's so good :) I love Jonna Lee.

Holy Shit, new Jonna Lee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVWOZqsIm_0

Interview on her new solo project

http://www.anothermag.com/design-living/9616/the-ethereal-new-musical-endeavour-from-jonna-lee

this new one sounds a lot like Ellie Goulding to me

Love the song and the video! My boyfriend also asked if it was Ellie Goulding while I was watching it. I can hear some inflections in her voice that sound similar.

Looks like this marks the end of IAM project as well. If this is chapter 2, bring it on!

I just want more grinding, ala "Clump". As much as I love ethereality, we live in friction.

Returning to this, discovering it has fewer views than many shitty videogame playthrough segments, has confirmed my opinion that Western Civilization deserves to collapse.

Sanpaku OTM

NOT HUMAN, JUNE 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z3n5TJB4Xk

So stoked. Samaritan just keeps getting better with repeated listens.

Looks amazing!

"Concert in Blue" was so good as well. "The Deadlock" an original song from that session, is prime IAM

Not sure why Jonna felt the need to distinguish this from the iamamiwhoami material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Xdov_B-cQg

IONNALEE is Jonna doing it on her own afaik. IAM was more collaborative

Really good single as usual. Kinda feel like it doesn't have the usual layers of IAM's stuff though, where you can come back to it and find something new - it's much more immediate. The outro is fantastic though

Given time I think "Blue" is close to as good as "Kin". Try listening to this while walking by the seaside on a sunny day, it accompanies the empyrean sparkle of water perfectly. "Kin" is more of a weird and tense record, but "Blue" is absolutely consistent in its embodiment of the air/water elements. It's a release and exorcism of demons and reclamation of joy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzqJCco1WE8

just cuz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUSDfx9ItWs

new song on friday is a redux version of this apparently http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=4yAI5_YXNqI

excited

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihd9dKek2gc

newest single, favorite of the bunch and reminiscent of Blue era

so I never, ever hear about this woman's work outside of ILX and via people who have liked it on youtube. maybe i'm out of touch; I think all of it is pretty great; does she have any kind of presence outside of these narrow confines?

hi akm, yeah would say she does to some extent. rym rated Kin as #82/1200 albums in 2012. Will say out in the wild I don't meet a lot of iam fans, probably know about 3 tbh

new album feb 16 "everyone afraid to be forgotten"

thankfully this time Jonna put out less advance singles than she did for "Blue" which ended up making the album a tad familiar on first listen.

technically this is a new artist and not imamamiwhoami anymore

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gF-8uJUpL5A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Dt3-1la9ug

nice