Name: Dinnertable
Members: Johan Åkerström, Emil Källman

Nationality: Swedish
Occupation: Songwriters
Current Release: Dinnertable's new single "Again Again" is out via Dinnertable/Corite.
Recommendations: The photo ”Desert house party” by Slim Aarons; The album Is this it by The Strokes

If you enjoyed this interview with Dinnertable and would like to stay up to date with the band's music, visit them on Instagram, Facebook, and Soundcloud.



When did you start writing/producing/playing music and what or who were your early passions and influences? What was it about music and/ or sound that drew you to it?

As far as we can remember we’ve always loved music and we started a rock band during our late teens.

Back then we were drawn to the punk-side of music with influences such as the Clash, the Strokes and Arctic Monkeys.

When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening and how does it influence your approach to creativity?

We see pictures, places and seasons of the year in our minds.

”Again Again” is a late summer evening and a nice cocktail party by the pool surrounded by hazy mountains and light green fields (in our minds).

How would you describe your development as an artist in terms of interests and challenges, searching for a personal voice, as well as breakthroughs?

Back when we played in a band we had a place for rehearsals with drums, amps, PA-system and instruments and we could just jam any time and any day.

Today we don’t have access to that kind of place and equipment and we’ve had to improvise with what we have. 2 laptops and 2 apartments with some instruments (no drums). This has been a real challenge sometimes and we’ve had to ”sample” ourselves and recorded different fragments on our own and piece by piece created what is now ”full” productions. This has forced us to re-evaluate what making and playing songs is.

The personal voice has come as a bonus in our sound which is deep in a sense of us sampling ourselves over and over …

Tell me a bit about your sense of identity and how it influences both your preferences as a listener and your creativity as an artist, please.

We identify ourselves somewhere between a rock band and a DJ. That also means we listen a lot to both bands and electronic solo artists.

What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to music and art?

The key idea is that it’s fun to create and digest music and art.

How would you describe your views on topics like originality and innovation versus perfection and timelessness in music? Are you interested in a “music of the future” or “continuing a tradition”?

We are interested in ”timeless” pieces of art and it’s really hard to specify. But we are always trying to create something timeless and at the same time something ”fresh” and ”engaging” for our present listeners. Hopefully we are doing it right.

Over the course of your development, what have been your most important instruments and tools - and what are the most promising strategies for working with them?

We love electric guitars and our strategies are just playing and recording them but also sampling them, pitching, time stretching and converting them to MIDI.

Take us through a day in your life, from a possible morning routine through to your work, please.

During the day we both have work and studies. But in our spare time we meet, we play the guitar and we make music.

Could you describe your creative process on the basis of a piece, live performance or album that's particularly dear to you, please?

Our track ”Again Again” is a very typical example of our dear creative process.

It all started at a dinner party at Emil’s place where we had a nice dinner, some nice wine and some tequila and started jamming with two guitars, a mic and some recording equipment. After just a few minutes we had the riff, verse, pre-chorus and chorus for ”Again Again”. We added some drum machine beats and synth-bass and made a demo that we enjoyed for ourselves for a couple of months.

Then we hired a professional studio and listened to some demos and got struck by the Again Again demo. So we sampled the demo (chopped it up into pieces) and started playing around with the pieces, added some new bass guitar and re-recorded the vocals and basically did a remix on the demo which is now ”Again Again”.

Listening can be both a solitary and a communal activity. Likewise, creating music can be private or collaborative. Can you talk about your preferences in this regard and how these constellations influence creative results?

We listen a lot to music together but also on our own. Every time we meet and/or talk we share our latest song recommendations.

Surprisingly often, when listening to music together, our perception of the music itself changes.

How do your work and your creativity relate to the world and what is the role of music in society?

Oh, we haven’t thought about this one. We just create music we like for fun and hopefully our music brings joy to other people.

Art can be a way of dealing with the big topics in life: Life, loss, death, love, pain, and many more. In which way and on which occasions has music – both your own or that of others - contributed to your understanding of these questions?

Music is therapy for us both. It’s hard to specify exactly how and sometimes it’s really random, for example when your happy you want to listen to really sad and dark songs and vice versa when you’re happy.

How do you see the connection between music and science and what can these two fields reveal about each other?

Everything is science and music is everything.

Creativity can reach many different corners of our lives. Do you feel as though writing or performing a piece of music is inherently different from something like making a great cup of coffee? What do you express through music that you couldn't or wouldn't in more 'mundane' tasks?

Every form of creativity is also a form of expressing emotions, and music is great in that it can contain so much information as opposed to making a great cup of coffee.

Music is vibration in the air, captured by our ear drums. From your perspective as a creator and listener, do you have an explanation how it able to transmit such diverse and potentially deep messages?

It’s all reflected in our emotions.

So if you feel emotional listening to our music you’ll probably hear ”more” in our songs than if you’re emotionally unavailable.