Transformation is at the core of Chris Corner’s music and outlook. Ever since leaving wildly successful 1990s trip-hop group Sneaker Pimps, Corner’s process of becoming IAMX, beginning in 2004 has been theatrical, transcendent and communal. Androgynous and visceral, IAMX has metamorphosed from small-town blue-collar kid to international pop star in the 1990s to creator of raw art that disrupts gender and genre in the 2000s. Fueling electronic experimentation with punk energy and confessional lyricism, Corner’s goth and industrial sound, fashion, performances, videos and persona are larger than life, iconoclastic and shockingly intimate.
In addition to his success as a songwriter, producer and touring artist, IAMX is one of the most licensed musicians on ABC TV’s runaway hit show, How To Get Away with Murder. By the end of 2017, IAMX had synced 16 of his songs to its soundtrack, becoming one of the most recognisable composers on television thanks to the show’s creator Pete Nowalk, being a superfan of IAMX.
Another superfan turned collaborator is postmodern tattoo and makeup powerhouse, kindred spirit Kat Von D, who sings on four songs on the brand new album Alive In The New Light and shares IAMX’s avant-garde fashion and design sense, epic stage theatricality and gender-bending proclivities. IAMX’s provocative aesthetics are not limited to his music and fashion. As a video artist, he crafts IAMX’s stunning live visuals and most of their music videos, as well as videos for other acts, most notably his close friend Gary Numan.
IAMX isn’t clear where this newfound liberation will lead him. Rising from a humble working class background to capitalistic celebrity, then down to the depths of despair and back into a new light, IAMX’s armour is now more permeable and his imagination more stimulated by Los Angeles’ unrelenting optimism. For Chris Corner, turned IAMX, the transformative journey that began in his bedroom as a young kid in the North East of England and found its way into the California desert continues. The I AM in IAMX may imply stasis, a fixed state of being, but the X signifies the variable in mathematics, and IAMX the person is in no way done evolving.
IAMX is currently on tour presenting his new album Alive In The New Light and will perform at De Casino (St-Niklaas, Belgium) on Thursday March 1st.
