Rock isn't dead; at least not yet
From left, Zeze, Dguru and DR of Idiotape perform at the Rainbow Island Festival on Nami Island, Gyeonggi Province, in June 2012. / Courtesy of VU Entertainment
Idiotape's heavy, analogue sound is fresh blast in era of digital neatness
By Kim Young-jin
It was early one morning in Japan when the members of Idiotape realized they could be on the cusp of something big.
The three-piece from Seoul, little-known in the neighboring county, was slated to play one of the first sets of the 2011 Summer Sonic festival in Tokyo. Given the early time, the audience was sparse.
“I told the band to forget about it and just play for ourselves,” Idiotape’s drummer, who goes by the name DR, recalled during an interview. “But I played with my eyes closed.”
He was shocked when he looked again: the band’s pulsating instrumentals, created by fusing analogue keyboards with live drums, had attracted a huge crowd.
Given its trajectory since forming in 2008, fans are likely to continue flocking to see the band, whose beats are tailor-made for both clubs and the mosh pit. Their success on the festival circuit suggests that there is plenty of demand for their sound at home and abroad.
More than anything, it’s the booming bass drums and fuzzy, propulsive keyboards that will draw listeners in. But the band _ comprised of DR, Dguru (production) and Zeze (synthesizer), say it is their tight relationship and interaction with the audience that inspires their music.
That chemistry is being put to the test now as the band makes its second full-length album after their debut,
put them on the map with songs such as the electro-romp
What the new effort will sound like, only time will tell.
“That’s what we’re struggling over at the moment,” said DR. The band added that most of their songs are the product of jam sessions.
The band was conceived in 2007 when Dguru and Zeze met in Seoul’s club scene. The two formed a band with a guitarist, but when he left, they decided to add live drums.
“It took a while to get accustomed to playing with keyboards, not guitars,” said DR, who cut his teeth playing in metal bands in Incheon. “But I quickly got used to it.”
The band’s name is an amalgam of the words “idiot” and “ape,” but also reflects nostalgia for cassettes and other analogue equipment, which the band favors over digital technology.
Analogue equipment records waves in their original form while for digital technology, analogue sounds are simplified, turned into number sequences and stored on digital devices.
“The sounds of analogue instruments can be transferred to digital ones,” said Dguru. “But something is lost.”
The band cites a wide range of influences from the Doors and Radiohead to heavier acts such as Metallica and Pantera. Their songs introduce themes and deftly weave them throughout. “Even Floor” features a stop-and-go bass line that gradually accelerates to a furious pace. The off-rhythm analogue blip at the start of “Heyday” fades into the background as a bright, feel-good melody kicks in.
The formula has been successful here and internationally. The band has been featured on MTV Iggy, which focuses on global music trends and also been involved in the Creator’s Project, a venture between Intel and Vice to highlight artists who use technology to push the boundaries of expression.
The band realizes that they have come a long way since that consolidating moment in Tokyo. When they played at the Future Music Festival in Malaysia in March, they met fans that had traveled to the site especially too see them play.
Zeze said the excitement of the live shows is created by the interaction between band and audience.
“If I see the crowd reacting to a particular sound, I can turn that up, or bring it into the background,” he said. “There are many ways to (manipulate the sound to) convey emotions.”