I’ve never been able to stream my music. I used to live far out in the country, where all good WiFi plans were actually impossible to get from my location and the 3G towers were also pretty far away. Recently however, my abode has been relocated closer to my small town and I can enjoy all the LTE I could ever want, as well as getting an unlimited data plan for my phone by a lucky chance.

This glorious new chapter in my life opened up the wonderful world of music streaming, where I’ve been able to venture out from behind my wall of Fall Out Boy CDs and actually explore my music taste further without having to take a trip to Best Buy.

Something very interesting has come up during the “experimental college years” phase of my music taste however. A friend that I’ll refer to as Rylee, since that’s her name, has been giving me music recommendations lately. One fairly new band we’ve enjoyed though, is rather strange and offers elements I believe ARG fans will enjoy sinking their teeth in to. It’s not a full rabbit hole, at least not yet, but it’s very thought provoking, and I already have some theories of my own I want to dive in to in the future.

I DON’T KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME

A name that’s struck a cord in the alternative charts, yet not many have looked in to them beyond their music, and even fewer have really dug in to their whole aesthetic head first and over-analyzed it the way I like to over-analyze everything. While there’s things to put under the magnifying glass, it’s not a huge trail of breadcrumbs quite yet. But if you’re looking for an intriguing new music group with a fun cryptic story and things to explore, you’re going to enjoy this.

I DON’T KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME (Often shortened to IDKHOW) is a musical group consisting of Dallon Weekes and Ryan Seamen. If you have similar music taste to mine (read: edgy pop rock), you might recognize these folks from their previous work on Panic! At The Disco and Falling In Reverse respectively. They’ve been touring together along the west coast for a while, intentionally under the radar. Fairly recently, they’ve built a large internet presence and campaign, now advertising their shows. They’ve released two singles, both enjoying some nice spots on alternative charts and the popular sections of music services, as well as a handful of songs they’ve only played at shows so far.

But what the band literally, and technically, is isn’t what they want you to think about when you hear their name.

I DON’T KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME is the name of a fictional band and a bit of a character. After struggling and failing to find success in the late 70’s to early 80’s, they faded away, never to be seen again. But old tapes of the band have begun to surface, and the lost band is being dug up out of the depths of age and obscurity. It’s a normal pastime for the internet today, and whole wikis are devoted to lost media. However, on occasion, these lost bits of recent history can be just ever so slightly off. A small feeling of being harshly unsettled one could do without, but no clear in-your-face justification as to why. The band sits in an odd middle ground between both of these realities.

Scattered across various social media pages for the band are these tapes, as well as more traditional band promotion that still puts heavy emphasis on the fact there’s a gimmick that they want you to think about and enjoy. Everything is drenched in the aesthetic some way or another, from a Q&A session answered in the form of some of the old tapes to every post commemorating a milestone of instagram followers being a reference to an old, sometimes obscure, 70’s-80’s program or product.

But not everything is a retro-repurposing. Far from it. The largest recurring pattern throughout is another original product that never was. The Superstar Showcase is an old cable access talent show, where upcoming acts of all kinds can display their talent for the world to see. IDKHOW was an act on this program, but sadly, it just wasn’t enough for them to gain and maintain relevance, and they were forgotten before ever being remembered.

While there isn’t any sort of deep lore ingrained in to the cable access show, nor do I expect it to really be the focus of any deep development as things move forward, it sets the stage as a fun piece of world-building. And fun world-building is what most of the story and lore is so far.

However, the head-scratchers do exist. Going through all of them here would ruin the fun, but there are oddities out there that I encourage everyone to explore and think about for themselves.

Just remember the good old freeze-frame bonus tactic is alive and well.

I will be heading back to the topic with a follow-up to discuss my thoughts and ideas, look at some of the oddities, and point to what all the references are actually referring to very soon. Think of this as a primer and introduction. A basic descriptor of what exactly I want to get you in to before we really do it.

And listen to their music too. I have a good feeling it’s involved and lore-y on its own, to some extent.

IDKHOW LINKS

Website: Here

Youtube: Here

Instagram: Here

Facebook: Here

Twitter: Here

And if for some crazy reason you want to keep up with the website, you can always follow the Puzzling Matters Twitter, @PuzzlingMatters.