A year after meeting, Josh Christopher and Melis Soyaslanova seem poised to take the music world by storm. Performing as IYES the electro-pop duo set the blog worlds hearts racing with early demos “Glow” and “Lighthouse” before causing a near collective stroke a couple of weeks back with the Hype Machine blazing and utterly fantastic “’Til Infinity”.
While the demos were pretty amazing on their own, “’Til Infinity” marked a step up for the pair. Polished and full of confidence it’s infectious and exciting, vibrant with a tribal beat running throughout and counterbalancing the arctic melodies and electronic wizardry that themselves offset the mournful and poignant lyrics perfectly. Melis’ confident and near defiant (and gorgeous) vocal is juxtaposed with that of the more downbeat and remorseful, emotionally broken contribution from Josh.
It’s a glorious piece of music and one that shows that not only are they ready to step up a level, but that there is much more to them than the lazy XX comparisons they received early on. ”Glow” had already started to put those to bed with its big arms wide chorus and mystical electronic flourishes and “’Til Infinity” just smashes them to pieces.
They make pop music, but it’s not homogenised pre-packaged pop, it’s edgy and different but with enough accessibility to transcend the blogosphere and break the mainstream consciousness. Like Chvrches but without as many 80’s reference points and fewer lasers. It still sounds fantastic though and if they keep developing like they are, 2014 could well be the year of IYES.
Stalk IYES: Website /
Alphabet Bands 
Leave a Reply