Listening to the Icelandic band múm makes one feel extremely comfortable. Relaxed. Maybe for a moment undecided, but the organic sounds produced by six Icelanders are like a warm breeze that will hit our home as well. Interesting múm are coming to Kino Šiška today, where they will present their album Smilewound, released last year, just right for spring daydreaming. We talked to one of the band's founding members, Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason.
City Magazine: Listening to your music is like listening to a great story. What is the story behind múm and more than 15 years of creating wonderful sounds?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: Everything went by very quickly, so I didn't even have time to stop and think about the story. A few years ago we released a compilation of our first music called Early Birds. In order to make this compilation, we had to listen to hours and hours of old music and go through many boxes and tapes, which was like stepping into a time machine. But the last 15 years have been full of travel and music and it's been really great.
City Magazine: You're a pretty big band, so I guess inspiration comes from all over the place. What is it that inspires and motivates you the most?
Örvar Þóreyjarson SmárasonIt's hard to say, we draw inspiration from everything around us and when it shows up in music, we don't want to define what came from where. Let's say that we are inspired by "the world".
City Magazine: Would you describe yourself as a whole while making music?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: No, not at all. We tend to see ourselves as individuals who bring different things to the table and also to the music. Me and Gunni have a very long, solid and good working relationship, we've worked with a lot of friends and each of them has a certain genius that they bring to the music. However, in the end, music is one entity.
City Magazine: Which animal would you choose as a múm and why?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: When we chose the name múm, we actually started from a drawing of two elephants holding their trumpets, with a bird flying above them, which created a desolation above ú. So I can say that múm would be two elephants and a bird.
City Magazine: We were very happy to read that you studied film, because a film would never be what it is without music. You have also written some film music yourself. What kind of inspiration comes from writing music for films?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: Writing film scores is something we're quite ambitious about, and we feel like in the last 10, 15 years, film scores have slipped into negative territory. Film directors are under a lot of pressure from production companies, who strive for the film to be good and pleasant, so they especially want good and pleasant music. I think that can change a bit again, which is positive. We would like to create bold and acceptable film music, but of course we understand that we have to work with directors and producers to achieve this. But we can hope (laughs).
City Magazine: The great film composer Hans Zimmer once said: “You have to stay flexible and always you have to be my own critic.” We are probably all critical of our work. How do you look at your music after everything is ready and the album is about to be released?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: I never really listen to my music after we've made it. Maybe in a few years I'll be thinking about one or another track and I'll have to look it up. But when the song is finished, I generally move on to new things. Of course, it's important to be busy and critical of yourself, but when the song is done, it's done and you have to move on to the next thing.
City Magazine: What film genre would you prefer to write music for?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: Horror and sci-fi would be perfect for us, but I think we're happy with any genre as long as it's an interesting project with people we enjoy working with.
City Magazine: Some of your videos are amazing and have wonderful photography… What else do you think about your videos?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: I don't know, for the most part we let other people have complete freedom when it comes to making videos, so we haven't made our own music video yet, except for the first one, which was an accident. It was only a one-time recording at night for a song Ballad of the Broken Birdie Records (Ruxpin Remix II). Like I said, it was an accident, but somehow it became one of our most popular videos because MTV started playing it at night when people who couldn't sleep were watching it.
City Magazine: What did you do for the four years you took off before the release of your latest album, Smilewound?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: We took a long break between the releases of all the albums. We all have different projects that we work on individually and we usually wait for the right time to start creating again. At the same time, tours and concerts take up a lot of our time and they are just as important as the albums.
City Magazine: There are quite a few interesting things related to your last album, such as where you made it. Can you tell us more about it?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: It was written and produced all over the place, some tracks are brand new and some we've had ready for a while. For example, one of the tracks on the album was written and recorded in Estonia for our penultimate album Sing Along, but it just didn't fit in with the overall product, so she settled for that. I created another piece on an old acoustic guitar while I was living in Prague in 2005, but we transformed it into electronic music on Lebem and then it was time to release it.
City Magazine: You'll be playing a few festivals this summer. Which one are you particularly looking forward to?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: We're actually going to have a very light summer tour as we have another big project coming up. But this summer in Iceland there is a new festival called Secret Solstice Festival and we are already very much looking forward to performing there. At the same time, I also play at a few festivals with a band FM Belfast, which I play with, and the ones I'm probably most looking forward to are Sonar in Barcelona and Melt in Germany.
City Magazine: Your music can be very intimate. Where do you prefer to perform - at big festivals or in smaller clubs?
Örvar Þóreyjarson Smárason: I think we prefer to perform in theaters, churches, castles, town squares and music halls. Clubs and festivals are not the best for us, unless they are particularly good clubs or festivals, but the more special the environment in which we play, the better the atmosphere and consequently our performance.
Icelandic band concert yum will be in today Kinu Šiška.
