Indie pop, deep lore and fan theories: how iDKHOW give their fans more than just music

I Don’t Know How But They Found Me (iDKHOW) isn’t just your average indie-pop band – they’re a mesmerising duo that go above and beyond to enthral fans with more than just their music.

Comprising former Panic! At The Disco bassist Dallon Weekes and former Falling In Reverse drummer Ryan Seaman, I Don’t Know How But They Found Me – more commonly known as ‘iDKHOW’ – are a force to be reckoned with. Often likened as something of a ‘supergroup’, with two well-known legends at the helm, they’re not your run-of-the-mill band, and they’ve certainly moved past their pop-punk roots. They’re a whole backstory strewn with deep lore, and accompanied by brilliant music.

Although the band was originally aimed at being an anonymous band, Weekes and Seaman instead created a brilliant storyline for iDKHOW, making it not only an outfit who puts out pure indie-pop hits, but also takes fans on a deep dive into the band, which is shrouded in mystery.

check out iDKHOW’s latest single ‘Mx. Sinister’

As many know, most bands’ ‘backstory’ consists of friends who decided to start jamming together, then they realise it’s something good, and then they’re off to record their first EP, awaiting their big break.

Well, for iDKHOW, the premise surrounding the band’s ‘big break’ is that they were actually a previously undiscovered band who never had their ‘big break’. Instead, how they came to be well known was that an anonymous person began sharing recovered footage of the band back in 2017, thus iDKHOW was ‘born’.

Check out ‘Do It All The Time’ by iDKHOW:

When talking to Don’t Bore Us in 2020, Weekes noted that the beginning of iDKHOW was supposed to be something that him and Seaman just did for themselves and “nobody else” with the main goal of making music and playing gigs “for fun.”

“We wanted more to entertain ourselves, more than anybody else,” Weekes remarked. “We knew that it would be easy to come out of the gate waving a big banner saying, ‘Hey everybody! Follow us to this new thing that we’re doing.’ Doing something like that just felt really disingenuous, if that make sense?”

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So, instead of taking the conventional route, the duo decided to begin iDKHOW in a completely unorthodox path – they decided to create a backstory, and follow it through and through, even adding different clues and hidden meanings in their songs and music videos for fans to unravel more of the mystery that the outfit is shrouded in.

This means that between several singles, an EP, and their debut album Razzmatazz, the dynamic duo has kept up their story line, and expanded it, urging fans to dive into the lore that surrounds their music, and engage with more than just the tunes.

As Weekes stated in an interview with Dork, “we wanted to leave enough room for people’s imaginations to sort of wander around in this idea. […] Leaving room in the fictional narrative has created a lot of interesting theories that I’ve seen people talk about in places like Reddit, and some of it is way better than what I’ve come up with. It’s really interesting to see. Sometimes I’ll read through, and I go, I gotta use that idea!”

Check out iDKHOW’s ‘Leave Me Alone’:

Beginning the theory behind iDKHOW began in a rabbit hole, as all good things tend to do. As the outfit follows a very late ’70s/early ’80s vibe with its music videos, sounds, and style, Weekes confirmed that it all sparked from a star search-type program called Stairway To Stardom.

“I just became fascinated with it,” Weekes stated to DBU. It was like this weird parade of people. People would go on this public access show, and display their talents: singing, dancing, and comedy. It was so bizarre. I just fell in love with it immediately, and I wanted to be on that show. So, that’s kind of where the idea of being from that time period got it’s genesis from.”

As for the back story behind iDKHOW, and everything that’s come to fruition so far with their music videos, and song releases? Well, that’s for you to find out on your own. As iDKHOW has stated, “You can access anything instantaneously, so discovering things, I feel like maybe I could be wrong, but discovering things now has a little less weight,” meaning that you’ve got to do your own detective work.

So, check out a music video, find an Easter egg, and dive into the mysterious world of iDKHOW. As Weekes has confirmed, “everything we’re doing is symbolic or representative of something else.”