Imogen Heap's Tiny Desk Concert

June 28, 2019 5:20 AM

Imogen performs several songs including a hauntingly beautiful version of Hide and Seek using her Mi.Mu Gloves.
posted by Foci for Analysis (12 comments total)

Oh, oh, thank you for this. This was lovely and a wonderful way to start the weekend. That was amazing.
posted by allandsome at 5:42 AM on June 28, 2019 [3 favorites]

I saw the first night of performances she did at The Town Hall in NYC. As of a few years ago I thought the gloves were a huge gimmick and I was overwhelmingly proven wrong.
She also used a system called d&b soundscape Which uses crazy German magic to create sound fields that have unbelievable localization ability without blasting the audience members next to surround speakers. It allowed sound to reach the far side of the theater in a way that blew my mind. Full disclosure: I have friends who work on that project and I was similarly dubious of it before going into this concert. I definitely left as a believer though.
I would highly recommend seeing her on her current tour both for the music and the mind-bending technology.
posted by aloiv2 at 6:16 AM on June 28, 2019 [4 favorites]

I've been having a rough week, and after that astonishing version of Hide and Seek, I think I can face the day. Thank you for sharing this!
posted by xedrik at 6:40 AM on June 28, 2019

Neat, I haven't kept up with her doings since Frou Frou. I saw her at a club opening for Rufus Wainwright way back in '98 and was captivated then.
posted by octothorpe at 7:50 AM on June 28, 2019 [1 favorite]

I got to see her in concert a few years back and it was so magical. She wrote a song live on stage with us contributing and threw it all together. Small venue and intimate crowd. Wish I could have seen her on her tour this year.
posted by msbutah at 9:18 AM on June 28, 2019 [3 favorites]

Oh, nice! The Mi.Mu gloves are amazing, and she's such a fantastic songwriter and singer. Frou Frou and Speak for Yourself are my two most-listened albums, according to Last.fm. At least since 2006.

And Zoë Keating! She's also amazing! I love her work. Somehow I missed her most recent album, I am ordering immediately.

Really wish I'd been able to see them on tour this time around. I only have one complaint about Imogen Heap and that's the long wait between albums. The last album was in 2014, the one before that 2009, then 2005... Hopefully we're due for a new one soon!
posted by jzb at 10:42 AM on June 28, 2019

I saw her perform in DC the evening after she recorded this, and it was an absolutely magical experience.

I too thought the gloves were a gimmick until she demonstrated how some of the effects worked in between songs. It only looks fake/effortless because she's actually really freaking good at it.

I should also mention that this concert:
- Had no opening act
- Had an intermission
- Featured a surprisingly good Q&A session
- Kept reasonable volume levels for the entire thing
- Didn't have an encore ("Let's all just pretend I walked off the stage, you applauded, and obviously I'm going to play Hide & Seek, so let's just do that now.")

More concerts need to be like this.
posted by schmod at 12:32 PM on June 28, 2019 [14 favorites]

As a somewhat reclusive singer who's shy about asking people to collaborate, I would love to have a play with those gloves. Ideally I would like to have about 6 arms with a glove on each, and maybe a pair on my feet too.
posted by Pallas Athena at 3:26 PM on June 28, 2019 [2 favorites]

I had no idea about her brilliance until this post. I am blown away. Someone put "Speeding Cars" on a mix in like 2006 and I remember about the 5th time I listened to it, really hearing it for the first time. I clicked because I love that song and it's Friday afternoon and now I am a superfan who is going to watch it again right now.
posted by Duffington at 3:43 PM on June 28, 2019

Huh, she's only 41 now so she must have only been 20 when I saw her. She seemed like such a fully formed artist already at that point.
posted by octothorpe at 5:01 PM on June 28, 2019

Man, Imogen retroactively justifies my oft-ridiculed faith in gestural UI for digital performance. I've tilted at that windmill a few times, in undergrad and grad school. The various sensors on the gloves are all familiar to me. Turns out I just needed Imogen Heap and her collaborators to figure out a performative gesture vocabulary and freaking rock it... (by which I mean.. nothing but respect. This is freaking awesome).
posted by Alterscape at 6:43 PM on June 28, 2019 [3 favorites]

Oh. When you wrote "her gloves" it was actually "her gloves" as in "developed by her". That's impressive, both being an accomplished musician and someone who can bring a concept like that to the market. I would like to try on a pair, but they are not especially cheap at £2,500. I wonder how they stack up against the different "VR gloves" on the market?
posted by Harald74 at 1:32 PM on June 30, 2019 [1 favorite]