ionnalee Shares Iridescent New Track 'Luminary Rainbows'

Swedish audio-visual pioneer ionnalee shares new song “Luminary Rainbows,” a slow burn late summer track that journeys into a story of heavy hearted lucid dreams, told in her shimmering life-affirming voice. It’s taken from her anticipated ninth album, Close Your Eyes (English language version) & Blund (Swedish language version), set for release on September 13th 2024 via TWIMC.

Commenting on “Luminary Rainbows” ionnalee says, ”The song is about how we seem to gravitate towards illusory visions, dreams, hopes, or aims in life that we know are not real but they seem to be. Even though these hopes often leave you broken hearted, empty and sad, they still give so much life in the chasing that we need them to thrive.”

On deciding to release the album in two languages, English and her native tongue Swedish, the singer explains, “I recently moved out of Stockholm back to the area where I grew up in Östergötland. I’ve begun converting this old farmhouse into a studio. Singing in my mother tongue gives my artistry a different angle and that feels really exciting - it's like exploring a new language!”

Working with close collaborator Claes Björklund, the music sees a return to the electronic textures and analogue sounds that have brought ionnalee a fervent and devoted fanbase.

In March, ionnalee revealed the first taste of the new album with “innocence of sound,” on which she seizes the pure energy and glory that creativity leaves as a parting gift, and sets that power spinning into a breathless shining anthem for the troublesome times we find ourselves in. This was followed by “la la love” in May, ionnalee’s first ever love song. "It’s about looking at oneself from a wider point of view like one could in a dream, with all the physical disconnect in a less integrated world are we losing the power to feel love?” Most recent single “not your cherry” is, “about losing yourself in other peoples motifs and worlds and distancing from that, declaring your own freedom. "I won’t be the cherry on top.””

Talking about the new album, she says it, “is about how to dream in a dark time and how to be someone like me, an artist who feeds off of that ability for a living. How to get to a state of hopefulness, euphoria, sorrow in a time where the world seems less and less connected to other humans, to nature and to our future. How I find music, when made from the heart, still after working as an artist for 20 years, is a core element in my life. How crooked the view is of music’s value when it’s soundtracking our daily lives and can get us through the toughest of times.”

We last saw ionnalee when she released iamamiwhoami’s studio album the same week her son was born, in 2022. iamamiwhoami went on to wow audiences when she toured in Europe and South America, which included a special guest collaboration from Imogen Heap at her Earth show in London. 

10 years ago ionnalee became recognised as a powerful independent force in the music world, pioneering the world of audio and visual with her innovative projects under her solo moniker ionnalee and her iamamiwhoami project. ionnalee has garnered over 100 million Youtube views, collaborated with artists including Röyksopp, Moby, Imogen Heap, Joe Goddard, TR/ST and Zola Jesus, and eight albums later she shows no signs of slowing down. In 2018, ionnalee’s cult-like following co-funded her debut sold-out world tour in just 48 hours, breaking records for the fastest funded tour on crowdfunding platforms. Her own label To whom it may concern. also continues to function as a creative platform for herself and collaborators since 2010, most recently signing Swedish cult artist Jenny Wilson to the label in 2024 with TWIMC debut Alphabet of Absence. 

Tracklisting:

1.    La La love

2.    Innocence of sound

3.    Not your cherry

4.    Forgive her

5.    Luminary rainbows

6.    The end of every song

7.    Run wild

8.    Darkness is a real place

9.    You hold me like water

10.  Who

Photo credit: John Strand

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