It's evident that we are experiencing unusual times. While the internet once seemed to unite us, social media now appears to foster division and misinformation. Furthermore, digital archives can be unreliable – individuals invested years in shaping their Twitter personas, only to walk away from the platform in an instant. That's where the physical artifact becomes relevant – an increasing number of people are turning back to zine culture, which serves as tangible repositories of knowledge and authentic representations of community and creative collaboration.
IDER is leading the charge in this movement. Their upcoming album, ‘Late To The World,’ is set to release on February 21st through Nettwerk, and the alt-pop duo is planning an array of global tour dates.
Their final undertaking? Assembling a zine. This will serve as a platform to materialize their creative concepts, intertwining imagery, lyrics, snippets from the album sessions, and more – aiming to take their work off the digital realm, IDER seeks to preserve it and imbue it with significance.
In an article for CLASH, IDER delves into zine culture, discusses their new album, and reflects on the importance of tangible memories.
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It’s mid-February, and we are on the verge of releasing our third studio album, ‘Late To The World,’ with just a few weeks before touring across the UK, Europe, and North America. We have dedicated over two years to reach this moment – we’ve written and rewritten songs, recorded, produced, mixed, and mastered them, even created cleaner versions with radio potential. We’ve developed videos, visualizers, artwork, and promotional images. We’ve learned to perform the album with our new band and formed a new band. We’ve produced merchandise (including ‘You Don’t Know How To Drive’ car air fresheners in pine scent, if you're curious) and become full-time social media content creators, etc., etc.
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Yet, just at the final hurdle, as we are about to unveil everything we have worked on for the past two years, something seems missing. Amid the pre-album release frenzy, the only thing we could think to do was to close the door on all the impending deadlines and TikTok videos waiting to be created, and instead spend hours figuring out how to use InDesign to craft a zine and lyric book for our fans.
If we were to articulate this impulse, it would be to establish a physical foundation for this album; something that cohesively brings together the various elements of the project in a tangible format, distinct from the digital landscape. We wanted something substantial, collectible, and enduring, albeit limited.
As the album release approached, we suddenly realized that the single artwork we cherished and toiled over existed only as tiny squares on Spotify and Instagram, while press photos appeared sporadically in different articles online, videos were uploaded to YouTube, and the lyrics could be found on the internet—sometimes incorrectly (as we discovered when we forgot our own lyrics and had to search for them on Google).
Of course, we do have a digital landing page in the form of a website and a Linktree, but they are constantly changing and don’t provide a permanent home for this project. Everything feels a bit scattered. Much like a mother might create a scrapbook for her newborn, we felt a compelling urge to physically archive our album, marking our identity with a statement: ‘this is who you are.’
Historically, fanzines have served that purpose, acting as a kind of communal gathering point. Our fans have always connected deeply with our lyrics, and at our core, we are lyrics girls. Hence, it felt fitting to compile typed and handwritten lyrics alongside artwork, press photos, and stills from our videos to produce a zine that honors both our community and our desire to create a tangible home for ‘Late To The World’ where we can all gather and connect.
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IDER's new album, ‘Late To The World,’ will be released on February 21st.
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It's well known that we are experiencing unusual times. Whereas the internet used to unite us, social media now appears to foster division.