This summer marked 20 years since the release of Imogen Heap’s landmark folktronica album Speak for Yourself – featuring the beloved single Hide and Seek. If you saw that scene in The OC, you’ll never forget it. The album also influenced stars such as Taylor Swift, a noted fan who collaborated with the British singer on her 2014 song Clean; and Ariana Grande, who reimagined the track Goodnight and Go on her own 2018 album Sweetener. A new vinyl reissue is coming out to mark the anniversary.
Speak for Yourself was entirely written, produced and mixed by Heap, who has long been at the vanguard of music and technology, including her creative embrace of AI. Her fans talk about her one-of-a-kind “Imogenation”. She developed a pair of gloves that double as a wearable instrument, allowing her to record loops and add effects purely through gesture, and is now at work on a project called Auracles: a digital ID for music that encourages collaboration and fair licensing for sampling, and helps artists stake their claim to their work as AI muddies the waters of authorship.
You can ask Heap about any of this when she sits for the Guardian reader interview. Post your questions by 23 September 2025 and we’ll publish the best answers in a future issue of Film & Music.