The Viennese trio first gained attention in February on the video-sharing website YouTube with its music video "Life is greater than the Internet." <\/p>\n
The clip, showing a bird's eye view of six hands wearing fingerless gloves and typing away at three touchscreens, has since been viewed over 2.8 million times. <\/p>\n
"It was a test, we were rather surprised by all these viewings, but of course it's flattering," Seb, the "drummer," told AFP. <\/p>\n
Fascinated by the pocket-sized gadget's possibilities, the three members of the band, all in their mid-20s, imported Apple iPhones as soon as they went on sale in the United States in December and began experimenting with the accompanying software. <\/p>\n
"The idea was there even before the software existed," said Marina, an arts and communication student who is the band's singer and "pianist."<\/p>\n
The iPhone is very easy to play, says the band, which has composed three pop songs. <\/p>\n
"Of course the screen isn't very big and it doesn't have all the advantages of a real instrument," says Marina's brother Roger, the band's "guitarist".<\/p>\n
"But I can change the settings any way I please. For instance, I can play two different notes on the same guitar chord at the same time. And as long as there are new programmes, there will be new sounds," he added. <\/p>\n
The musical phone's only limitation is its lack of nuances: whether the player's touch is soft or hard the sound coming out of the instrument remains the same, making it ill-suited for classical music or jazz. <\/p>\n
"But then again, why not," added Seb. <\/p>\n
In the end, the iPhone is very similar to other instruments, according to the three musicians, who founded a punk group 10 years ago. <\/p>\n
"Like with other instruments, you have to practice until you get the sound you want," said Roger. <\/p>\n
"We're digital but in terms of melody, rhythm, we adapt to one another, these are not samples we play by clicking on a link," added Marina. <\/p>\n
Playing with only two fingers can also be physically demanding but according to Seb "the fingers are like drumsticks, to play well, you have to really relax your hands."<\/p>\n
Despite this unexpected publicity for its leading product, Apple hasn't contacted the band.<\/p>\n
"We're not looking to make money off of our services either," said Marina, although the band is in touch with a music software maker for iPhones. <\/p>\n
The trio, which does not yet have a record label, wants to finish writing at least a dozen songs before planning any concerts, but performances are definitely on its agenda. <\/p>\n
And "they will not be conventional concerts," Seb warned. <\/p>\n
Despite benefitting from the Internet buzz, the band advises web surfers to live life outside the virtual world. <\/p>\n
"Many youngsters spend most of their time on the Internet, playing online games for example. Perhaps we can get through to them because we play on iPhones," said Roger. <\/p>\n
"We mustn't forget that life is out there," added Marina. <\/p>\n
iBand has been invited to perform by the University of Melbourne, but for now, the trio will interact with its audience via a screen. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Six fingers and three iPhones are enough to create a band, and Austria’s iBand is living proof, having scored a hit on the Internet by converting the little gadgets into a guitar, a keyboard and a set of drums. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hardware"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3604"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3604"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3604\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}