Interviews - iamthemorning interview

Where you live?

St. Petersburg is an amazing place and i am happy that i ended up living here. I don’t thing there is any other city in Russia that I could live – StPete is closer to Europe in spirit than any other place in Ru, but at the same time it is so deeply and undeniably Russian. It's glorious, stunning, and deadly depressing. If you read Crime and Punishment, it must be easier for you to imagine what I am talking about, cause StPete hasn't changed a bit since then - apart from cars and terrible ads all over the place - but the spirit of the city, its atmosphere remains the same. All creative onces from all over the country are coming here to try and dedicate their whole life to what they are doing. You know they say that the best art is the art you’ve made while being sad. So here we are, perfectly logical to come to StP to make art.

Where you meet Gleb Kolyadin and how you get an idea to record an album together?

I’ve heard this question many times now and every time I am tempted to invent a story how a unicorn came to me in the middle of the night and led me to the fores where Gled was sitting playing the piano and magical sparks were flying all around him and the flowers blossomed around as I watched him play. :P

But no, all is pretty prosaic and boring. As this often happens, we've met through some common friends. Both our projects were falling apart so we got together one day at my place and started playing...it began with some covers and improvisations but we moved on to writing songs that were later on included to ~ real quick. That was beautiful, such a flow of pure creativity.

How it was in the beginning?

It's always exciting and always complicated. I also had a lot of things bothering me because Gleb and our string players we played with at that time were classically trained (and I am talking hardcore training here, meaning almost 20 years of education), whereas I never knew musical grammar even. Bu we ended up pretty well. Maybe that’s the reason it all works so well, cause we are so different.

And then comes "~" ?

Good guess!

We, obviously, did everything wrong, we had no idea how to do it properly, we had neither guidance nor experience. But still we're happy we did it the way we did. It has certain charm in it. The sound is all that..i don’t even know how to describe it in English, it’s scratchy and smooth at the same time. Scratchy as in a way when you touch a pine (yeah a tree) and you can feel the texutre of it. Or, it can also be a wool. It is soft and warm but at the same time it is ticklish. (I must sound like I am completely losing it here, hehe.) So, that’s what it is. A pine and wool. J

But back to the album - we didn't have any goal in particular. We just had the material and wanted to have it recorded. Maybe a part of me was ambitious about this project, but I never let my dreams come too far – I never believed we could make it too far. But the buzz started after we uploaded a newly mastered ~ to Bandcamp half a year after the release. That's when the word started to spread – and if I got it right, it started from PA and forum members (you were one of the first ones, right?).

What is your personally favourite track from "~" ?

Afis and Scotland.

After successfully kickstarter campaign, how it was in England during Belighted recording sessions?

England is amazing. Pure inspiration. We were terrified and had no idea what to expect, but everything went much better than we could have though. It was my first time in Europe and my first time seriously recording in a studio (all the vocals for ~ was recorded at home, hehe). The experience was extremely educating and what helped us believe in ourselves most is that the guys we worked with - Marcel van Limbeek team - believed in us much more that we did. We couldn’t help thinking "if someone who's been working in the industry for decades tells us that our music is something special – maybe there is something about it?”

And then you signed with probably the best prog label in England?

And then we tried to get signed. I think it took us a year. Funny thing here is that I even sent them ~ on CD with a letter after we released it. Of course they never answered, but I am naïve and always go for something even if I know it’s highly unlikely. Lik – I gave Steven Wilson a USB with our first album when he visited Russia, that’s the silly kind of “naïve” I am talking about here J)

Without a shade of doubt, Belighted is the masterpiece of contemporary prog. It was a pretty hard work to complete such an album, I guess?

Yes, it was. The most complicated thing was to record all the parts and mix them together to sound properly. 5/4 was a disaster with all the instruments mashed up together. But once we started adding instruments to the core of grand piano and vocals, we couldn't stop. It's always important to know where to stop when making arrangements more complicated, and we kept missing that line all the time – but not anymore. At least we learned something. What we also learned is that you will ALWAYS break the initial deadline you’re setting for yourself. Although, this might only be true for us haha

How it was to work with such a big name of prog rock as Gavin Harrison (Porcupine Tree, King Crimson) ?

It's hard to explain, really. He is - obviously, and everyone knows that - an amazing musician, but he's also a wonderful person. So friendly and so helpful and so down to earth. It was a great pleasure to work with him and we totally will work together again.

I clearly remember that I felt totally surreal when he started sending us his parts. The first one dropped in my mailbox when my phone was 2% charged and I was far from home and I was like “my favorite drummer of all time sends me his parts for our song and I can’t even listen to it”. That was funny.

Tell me about your popularity in Russia?

I tell you this - the amount of people that go to our gigs in StPete and Moscow is enough to pay the gigs themselves off - and we don't play in clubs, we play in concert halls and chamber venues, and this is always very expensive. But we need to make the events special so we choose quality instead of profit. Sometimes it is sad to work for months for the sake of one evening and never earn anything even to go celebrate it, but we have pretty pictures that remind us of that days. And we all – the musicians and the listeners - have beautiful memories, and people bring their friends next time - so overall it's a very pleasant experience.

But never ever a single time any Russian magazine or big media-resource mentioned us, at least once. This is getting ridiculous. I used to be really pissed off about that, but not I find this pretty amuzing J

How is with prog rock scene in Russia now?

Surprisingly, it seems that prog becomes pretty popular here. More and more bands that used to play post-rock suddenly say they are playing prog :D But I can’t really tell you more than that – I don’t keep track of what is happening with music in Russia. I used to, but then I realize it only makes me sad.

Do you make a plans for a tour?

Oh yes! Meet a lot of amazing people and sleep on couches and floors. I really can’t wait to hit the road and play to the people in Europe and say hi to everyone I’ve been talking to online for months (and sell some merch too!:)). I think this will be an amazing experience.

What you think about this decade regarding prog rock in general?

Well to be fair, how adequate can I be speaking about something like that? I try to listen to a lot of music – not just prog, though I really love it – but it’s hard for me, normally I just don’t have time and once I like a band I listen to it for months.But to answer your question - I love how the genre involves. I love how everything changes and how proggers start to make their music more listener-oriented. A lot of attention to sound, but it seems to me that bands are trying to make it more musical that technical and complicated. They are starting to try and make it more easily comprehensible, if that makes sense to you at all. A lot of new young bands that play amazing music. What is also nice is that industry becomes more friendly towards the young musicians. Journalists are not just writing about Steven Wilson now, but about some very new bands. Yay!

Your favourite albums released in this decade?

OUCH! That’s a tricky one. At least it’s not a “top-10” question.

Tool – 10 000 days

Kate bush – 50 words for snow

Karnivool – Sound awake

Rishloo – Eidolon

Riverside – Second Life Syndrome

Storm Corrosion – Storm Corrosion

Steven Wilson – TRTRTS

Oceansize – Everyone into Position

Anathema – We’re Here because we’re here

Do you work on the new songs?

We’re recording the album three already J Shall be finished by December if my recovery goes ok.

My favourite song from Belighted is 5/4. I think it's the best song on the album. Tell me something more about that majestical song?

Well, our Russian listeners that go to gigs know very well that this is the only cheerful song by iamthemorning - and still it's about pain and death as the rest of them, hehe. The full band live version is included into the live release that we are running the KS campaign for and it was released to Backers a few days ago. You’ll hear that Moscow people know very well that we need them to participate when we pay it - they always clap in the pauses in the beginning and middle of the song where strings play pizzicato. We tried to record claps for the album but they sounded poor so we only used part of them in the "circus" section of the song. I've also found my notes for the recording of the album that i did in London in my lyrics notebook and one of the notes for 5\4 says "a sound of the breaking of a bottle of 1864 year shardone" :D wut!

When we can expect a new official video by iamthemorning?

Very soon, hopefully before the Kickstarter campaign is over – we’re releasing a new House of Composers live.

How was on your first gig in London? How the audience received your music?

This was amazing! To be honest I felt a bit weird knowing that we will have to play on a METAL festival (though, on a prog stage) in from on the people that probably have never heard of us, and we’ll only have the piano and cello with us… But it went amazing! I’ve been told that it’s very seldom when the audience is completely silent during the songs and so enthusiastic in between them J I was so relieved and so happy they liked it after (and before) all the very loud heavy bands.

Which female singers you listen to?

Anneke, Kate Bush, obviously, Maria Franz from Euzen and Georgia Train from Bitter Ruin and my favorites. Also Bjork J

Marjana, thank you for the interview!