With a run of prestigious IAMX live dates coming this Summer and Autumn, the long-running project of Chris Corner is making two releases previously only on sale physically at his live shows, available digitally for the first time.
The ‘UNMASK’ EP and ‘IAMIXED’ containing a selection of Reworks from the two ‘Fault Lines’ albums act as both reflection and transformation. Corner said of these releases “I’ve never been fully convinced by the idea of a final, perfect product. There’s a lot of material that was peripheral but still connected.”
‘UNMASK’ captures IAMX through B-sides, a rework and a recontextualised album track via 4 great songs that deserve a bigger audience. “Those tracks felt like orphans” Corner explained, “They didn’t belong to the ‘Fault Lines’ family, but they don’t feel like part of the next thing either”; first introduced in a 2025 music video and from ‘Fault Lines²’, the “ArtBleedsMoney Rework” of ‘Grass Before The Scythe’ sees Corner trapped waltzing in The Upside Down with a superbly anxious vocal performance to enhance the textural tension.
Already released to streaming platforms ahead of ‘UNMASKED’, an exhilarating array of modular pulses act as the backbone to ‘Artificial Innocence’. With “extraordinary needs”, the heavy yet fragile reflection on submission, control and emotional emptiness also comes in its earlier incarnation sans arpeggios; called the “UNMASK Mix”, it offers a scratchier noise ridden take that is no less emotive, but unlike much of the generic darkwave at present, the noise is used effectively and not overbearing while the piano adds an emotive contrast.
Also beautiful piano accompaniment, ‘Radical Self Love’ is the bard stripped bear with dramatic vocals before synths and drums steadily join in to provide a mighty climax. Then in the haunting ‘There Will Be Times When I Will Need To Hurt You’, there is a demonstration as to how dark anti-love songs are done.
On the album-length IAMIXED, a number of songs off the two ‘Fault Lines’ enter altered states through collaboration and reinterpretation. Grammy-nominated producer Ryan McCambridge as MIMETIC HEXES provides two of the highlights; ‘The Truth’ is dramatic and swathed in filmic mystery while keeping the vocals abstract while there is an icy percussive intensity to ‘Infinite Fear Jets’.
Corner himself presents an orchestral arrangement of ‘War Of Words’ and a dreamlike modular reinterpretation of ‘In Bondage’. ‘Disciple’ reworked by harshwave duo HOLY BRAILLE thumps and fuzzes is a threatening but accessible manner and in not dissimilar territory, there’s a swirling menace to emerging electronic artists DAMN THE WITCH SIREN’s take on ‘Thanatos’. Best of all though is ‘The X ID’ reworked by goth-popsters clubdrugs.
While these two releases might be a holding pattern in the wider scheme, the evolving creative journey of IAMX continues.
The ‘UNMASK’ EP and ‘IAMIXED’ are available on streaming platforms via Unfall Productions from 22nd May 2026 at https://iamx.bandcamp.com/music
IAMX live dates in 2026 include:
Thale Unter dem Himmel (31st July–1 August), Hildesheim M’era Luna (9th August), Leiria Extramuralhaus (21st August), Manchester Infest (21st-23rd August), Oberhausen UNITY (18th–19th September with VNV NATION), Berlin UNITY (2nd–3rd October with VNV NATION)
Tickets to all upcoming shows are available now at https://iamxmusic.com/pages/iamx-live
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Text by Chi Ming Lai
4th May 2026
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