Longboat Unveils Word Gets Around: Igor Keller Expands His Creative Vision
In partnership with MPT Agency
By Nia Bowers
Seattle-based artist Igor Keller, the driving force behind Longboat, returns with his latest release, Word Gets Around. Known for his thoughtful songwriting and genre-blending style, Keller continues to refine his sound with this 32nd project — a record that highlights his commitment to originality, consistency, and musical craftsmanship.
From Jazz Roots to Pop Minimalism
Igor Keller’s background is in jazz, that school of rhythm, intuition, and improvisation that teaches musicians how to think in movement. But Longboat isn’t jazz, at least not in the traditional sense. It’s sharp-edged pop minimalism, wired with restless curiosity. Beneath its sleek, synthetic pulse runs the discipline of a jazzman who knows exactly when to pull back and when to let the sound breathe.
Exploring Modern Chaos and Human Connection
Word Gets Around wrestles with the modern condition, exploring media chaos, economic anxiety, and the constant hum of burnout. Songs like “Yelltown”, Igor Keller’s darkly affectionate portrait of his own Seattle neighbourhood, channel a world where everyone’s shouting but no one’s really listening. The album’s visual campaign, full of static, surveillance motifs, and disembodied faces, only deepens that sense of disorientation. Yet beneath the distortion lies empathy and a recognition of what it means to stay human when everything feels digitised. Check him out on Spotify!
A Stand Against Artificial Emotion
For Igor, that humanity is sacred. He’s wary of AI’s creeping influence on songwriting, calling it “the beginning of the end for human storytelling” if not careful.
“If machines can fake emotion well enough, people might stop caring about the real thing,” he says.
It’s a typical Igor Keller line, both prophetic and stubbornly romantic.
The One-Man Band That Refuses to Break Up
Even with his steady flow of releases and his plan to record eleven albums this year alone, Igor Keller insists that Longboat remains an “un-break-up-able” band. It’s a one-man project that never quite feels solitary, each track pulsing with the energy of a full ensemble, a ghost orchestra under his command.
What makes Longboat compelling isn’t just Keller’s productivity or his disdain for convention. It’s the way he captures post-digital exhaustion without succumbing to it. His songs don’t try to soothe the noise; they confront it, mimic it, and outsmart it.
Listening Over Scrolling
Igor Keller’s Longboat feels almost radical. It stands as a reminder that music, at its core, is still about listening, not scrolling.
“Word Gets Around” is available now on all streaming platforms.