Interview with Iameb 57

Interview with the prolific IDM producer Iameb 57. For more information on his project go to his website or here. Also be sure to check out his amazing track Rope Bleed on the Wounds of the Earth Compilation II

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Firstly, tell us about the name of your project, Iameb 57. How did you come up with it / what does it mean?

iameb 57 was a name I created when I was in highschool. Back then, I use to write a bunch of song names down on this notepad I had with me all the time, it was actually a song title first before I decided to make it my Artist name. It stands for I- AM - EATING -BEATS. the 57 was how many samples, instruments, drums, and automations I used to produce my first IDM track.

How did you get into IDM/electronic music? What are your influences?

I got into IDM music back in 1997. The first time I heard strange electronic music was from Aphex Twin. His Come to Daddy ep was out in stores and I expected the album to be all metal! I wasnt really into electronic music. But once i heard the madness he produced, I got sucked into the IDM scene. From there on, I started listening to everything on the Rephlex Records Catalogue, which sparked a lot of my inspiration. Today, most of my influnces come from old school IDM Artist around 1997-2006 time. Rephlex Records, Tigerbeat6, Warp..etc,.. and artist like Autechre, Seven Ark, Cex (before 2002), Cenik, Bit_Meddler, Phonem, hrvatski, diagram of suburban chaos, Gimmik, u-ziq , Ovuca, Fizzarum, Arovane, and mainly Lexaunculpt; which is my biggest influence today. Most of my highschool memories and my life are also very influential towards my productions.

Tell us about the process of creating your latest album, Tipsy Hax.

Tipsy Hax took me about 4-5 months to complete. The tracklisting was actually longer, and I was debating whether or not some pieces fit together and took out some others that didn't make the album tracklisting. There are some songs on the album that were made together as one; you can hear them connect with each other on the album. The idea behind it was to make it short but effective.

One thing I noticed was that a lot of your songs are rather short, like 2 minutes or less. Any particular reason you like creating short pieces?

I don't make my songs purposely short for a reason. When I produce a track and I've accomplished getting the kind of sound and vibe I want out of it to express how I feel, its done to me. Tipsy Hax had lots of songs that were short; its my way of expression.

What equipment are you using? hardware/software? What's your favorite gear?

The Software: FL Studio & Reaktor 5
VST's: FM7,FM8, Unique, Sylenth, ..and other various Vst Plugins/Synths

Hardware: Korg nano (Midi Keyboard), Korg MicroKORG Synthesizer/Vocoder, Alesis MICRON Analog Modeling Synthesizer, and a Sp202 Sampler.

So you have two other projects, Artificial Dreamer and Enabl.ed, tell us a bit about those.

Artificial Dreamer is more of my Progressive Trance productions. I actually had my Artificial Dreamer material put out first before any of my IDM stuff. But most of my Artificial Dreamer Projects have no similarities to my iameb 57 productions at all.

Enabl.ed was an alias name I made due to my signing with Nueva Forma. I made an agreement with the label that my iameb 57 releases will stay on Nueva Forma under the terms of the contract. So making "Enabl.ed" gives me more the opportunity to release with other labels. My Enabl.ed productions are very similar to my iameb 57 productions. No change in genre at all. If you like all my iameb 57 material, my Enabl.ed releases are just as good. :-)

What do you have planned for the future?

I will continue making more IDM music. I have a few more releases coming out this year with my Enabl.ed alias and iameb 57 name. Plus, 2 collaboration alias' with my label Nueva Forma. Definitely more to look forward to.