by Red Cell
Last December, a series of ominous videos began appearing in email boxes at various websites and blogs. These very short clips, most around a minute long, featured dark, earthy imagery, disarticulated limbs, snow covered shacks, dogs, lots of fluid and a naked girl covered in some kind of black muck, licking trees. In an era that is over saturated with viral campaigns, these videos are strangely compelling and have caught the attention of everyone form MTV and Pitchfork to the most obscure of music blogs. Everyone wants to know, “Who is iamamiwhoami”?
The name comes from a YouTube account that has been uploading these high production vignettes. Each video has a corresponding number sequence as a title. It didn’t take too long to figure out that the numbers were, for the most part, sequentially the alphabet. Here are the six titles in order: Educational, I Am, It’s Me, Mandragora, Officinarum and Welcome Home. Each video also features a specific animal (whale, bee, owl, goat, llama, chimpanzee). There are only six clips so far and each seems to be part of a much grander world than the limited clips want to give us at this point.
Who this might be promoting has become a guessing game of the musical elite. Guesses have include, among many others: The Knife, Fever Ray, Goldfrapp, Christina Aguilera, Trent Reznor, NIN, Aphex Twin, Lady Gaga, Little Boots, Lykke Li, Björk and MGMT. All of which seem to have some vague connection to the videos in one way or another.
The three top guesses have been, believe it or not, Christina Aguilera, The Knife and Goldfrapp. Aguilera’s people have denied it, The Knife just released a new album about a month ago and Goldfrapp’s new LP looks and sounds (the two trax I’ve heard at least) like airbrushed, 80s synth-pop. My best guess is The Knife or Fever Ray (a side project of Karin Dreijer Andersson of The Knife) because of the aesthetic qualities and the subject matter of the films. But, the voice is obscured and does not really sound much like Karin’s voice. It sounds more like Radiohead circa Kid A/Amnesiac. Who knows, maybe Radiohead has hired a female singer!
No matter who it is in the long run, they have captured the curiosity of a lot of people. Based on the interest in the videos alone, this person/group will have a huge fan base to keep entertained for some time to come.
THE VIDS IN ORDER FROM FIRST TO LAST:
Prelude 699130082.451322-5.4.21.3.1.20.9.15.14.1.12 (Educational)
9.1.13.669321018 (I Am)
9.20.19.13.5.723378 (It’s Me)
13.1.14.4.18.1.7.15.18.1.1110 (Mandragora)
15.6.6.9.3.9.14.1.18.21.13.56155 (Officinarum)
23.5.12.3.15.13.5-8.15.13.5.3383 (Welcome Home)
GO TELL ALL WILL BE 11 AM MONDAY
GOaT OwL WHaLE BE e 11AMa MON key
go tell all will be monday im thinking the reveal..
I’m thinking that Fever Ray is the most likely choice. The imagery and film quality seem most closely related to the Fever Ray videos, as does the music.
Karin often uses voice modulation in her songs, and I’ve heard a rumor that the male voices in The Knife are not her brother, but her. So, the voices in these songs could easily be her.
But, while The Knife recently released their new album, the sound and aesthetic are completely different. This makes me think the videos are not tied to the new album. But then again, the animals could relate to the over-riding theme of Darwin in “Tomorrow In a Year”. And, while listening to or reading the lyrics, the visuals of these videos easily fit. (See “Libretto” at http://rabidrecords.com/tomorrowinayear/)
Also, the album is a collaborative piece, which is a sign to me that maybe Karin is behind all of this, but is working with other artists. Who knows, maybe Karin and Christina and Bjork are in cahoots.