Describing their music as ‘Alternative Futuristic’, London-based outfit iNKOGNiiTO is certainly one of the most quirky and peculiar projects we have ever come across. Conceptualising their existence as a fictional character travelling the space and time continuum, the British creative explores leftfield electronica and bass-drenched matter, all crowned by a healthy amount of synthetic-sounding vocals.
‘Oddity Effect’ is the perfect evidence of that: iNKOGNiiTO’s ethereal and spacious tone develops over a sea of glitchy beats and abstract soundscapes. It’s a triumph of sonic over-excitement, a cathartic stream of crushing textures and otherworldly quirks. Sci-fi movies take up a lot of the inspiration behind the project, as we are about to find out.
Intrigued by the single, we caught up with the mysterious British entity to learn more about their artistry and future goals… interview below!
Hey iNKOGNiiTO, thanks for chatting with us! Thanks for travelling to our timeline, at least temporarily… Your project is pretty mysterious, we must say! Can you clarify the ethos and idea behind it?
Imagine you’ve lost all your memory… One day, you get a flashback & out of nowhere you glitch into an unknown place and realise you’re in a different timeline. After a while, as you unconsciously take information from multiple timelines, you begin to know and understand things that other people can’t see. This is the concept of iNKOGNiiTO. It represents balance and staying rooted in what’s your own, while exposing the damaging traits of denial and superficial happiness.
Where did the inspiration for such a complex and sci-fi-driven concept come from?
It came from a dark place in my life, where I felt out of place in my own existence. While experiencing this, I developed a deep trust in the concept I was creating. It taught me not to be scared of following my intuition even if it looks wrong or inconvenient for my environment – sometimes we have to trust ourselves to fail on our own terms. Then I found the glasses, iNKOGNiiTO’s been walking alongside me ever since. I didn’t realise the concept was sci-fi until I started sharing it with some people a few years later.
iNKOGNiiTO has a strong visual component – how do the project’s imagery and its sonic character relate to each other?
The existence of iNKOGNiiTO is what infuses the projects visually and sonically, creating a liminality. Each of my musical projects represents a different timeline iNKOGNiiTO is in. I like to create a full sensory experience out of that and bring people into it, which you can especially feel texturally in my photo shoots for my song ‘Space Tellz’ and my music video ‘Fragmented’. The current timeline iNKOGNiiTO is in is unknown.
You have recently released a leftfield and experimental number, ‘Oddity Effect’. It’s a clear picture of what your artistry stands for – bold melodies, heavy synthetic energy and the willingness to innovate. What does the song mean to you?
‘Oddity Effect’ carries a strong weight of conviction inside me. To me, it means leaning into the things that are contradictory. What does it mean to you?
Do you feel more confident writing music alone, or within a team? What’s your usual creative process?
Definitely alone, I’m a loner & feel most myself in that position. I’m beginning to work with other creatives IRL (in real life) now though, and learning to understand myself around other people. I don’t really have a creative process, but I’m always writing when I feel existential (which is every day) and it naturally just filters out into the music I’m making.
You are an incredibly unique artist and innovator. Is there anyone else in your scene – perhaps in London – who can relate to you? Do you feel part of a global movement?
Yeah, I think there are people that can relate to me, but I haven’t met them yet. I call my style of music ‘Alternative Futuristic’ and I’d like to build that into a scene: sci-fi films, retro gaming, talking about different realities etc. with my music genre at the core. This is for anyone who feels off in the world and wants to create an ‘alternative future’ – I’d like to see where that takes me. There’s no limit to what country or planet that could be.
Artistically speaking, what challenges have the last two years presented you with?
I’d say two things:
1. I find it really hard listening to music the more I make it, I only really listen to film scores these days.
2. Longing, I have a deep desire to create something bigger than myself and I’ve felt challenged by the actualising of my internal world externally.
What are the next steps for your project? Anything exciting on the horizon?
My EP iNKOMPLETE TERRiTORY. Look out for portals & maybe some aliens *glitches out*
