Favorite Artists: Jungle, Tycho, AM & Shawn Lee, Daft Punk, Radiohead, Bonobo, Kurt Vile, Washed Out
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Check out the recent single “Lose It All?” from Stockholm-based producer Finis Mundi. While his remixes have consistently received hype, this is only the second original release for the producer. His first original “Say That” was a smash hit, peaking at #22 in Spotify’s Global Viral Charts. After this initial success, it’s pretty clear Mundi is only going to get bigger and better. The second single “Lose It All?” flexes Mundi‘s comfortability with both pop and electronic genres, capturing a style that is remarkably akin to recent Mura Masa productions. We recently had the chance to catch up Finis and get the lowdown on his background, influences, songwriting/recording process, and much much more. Read our interview below and take a listen to the new gem below.
Where are you currently? How’s your Summer going?
I’m based in Stockholm, but currently nothing special is happening really. I’m a low-key type of person when it comes to Summer, as I see it more as an opportunity for me to really focus on myself and it always gives plenty of time to prepare an upcoming project for Autumn. I might get away a couple of days or a week this month to get at least some resting in and restore myself for what’s coming up next. As Post Malone says ”Now they always say congratulations, worked so hard, forgot how to vacation.”
For those just discovering you, tell us a little bit about your background and the type of music you like to make.
From Stockholm, Sweden. Asian descent. Released my debut single last year called ”Say That”, which in the beginning went fine but wasn’t until April this year and reached Billboard Top 50 Viral in The World chart, dethroning the great Zara Larsson as the highest Swedish act there. So now we felt that it was time to keep push it to new heights. Swedish modern pop music has always been the core for my music, in some ways. I just happen not to be that into it the same way as everyone else here in Sweden so my music is pretty much a ”bad attempt to try to make Swedish pop music” haha! I want that deceptively simple and unfussy-sound.
When did you first get involved with music and what were some of those earlier influences that pulled you in?
Father’s a pianist and produced back then so we are like Beethoven and his father – except for the pressure, as I’ve been playing piano myself for almost 20 years now. As I remember it, we had some decent surround sound speakers back then so my father still uses that, blasting any type of music. First day it could be flamenco, the other day acid jazz, so he always tried to convince me to be open-minded when it comes to being versatile.
But The Beatles has always been one of my earlier influences from the very beginning. The collection 1967-1970 is my all-time favorite.
Your remixes were some of the first things that put you on the map, right? At that time, had you started working on original songs, too, or did that come later? Did you always know you wanted to make your own tracks and will you still continue to put out remixes?
Remixes has always been a tool for me, right. They’re two different workflows for me working on original versus working on a remix so it’s just perfect for me to remind myself that there is different ways to be creative.Working on original came a time later as I wanted to be sure of my direction.
Back then, all I ever wanted was to try things out and see if that would be something I could be proud of in the near future.
I’m a really big fan of your new track “Lose It All?” Can you describe what the writing and recording process looked like for this one?
I’m overwhelmed by all the kind words I’ve received so far. Always prefers to have a day just to try to create something for the moment and then go back the day after to see if that’s still something interesting. Took me a couple of hours to make the first draft of it the day after and I told my manager that this would be a cool track to pitch it out to someone whereupon he responded that ”this is too good to pitch and give it away to someone else, how about we try to make something out of it ourselves?.” LAY and I were efficient as we both knew what direction we wanted the track to go.
What other artistic or creative mediums do you pull from outside of music? When you’re not doing the music stuff, where are you and who are you with?
I love nature, there’s so much forest around here in Sweden. I’ve always found it quite fascinating how the forests are so close to the urban life here in Stockholm. It’s modern, but still organic. Other than doing music, I’m into photography. One of my dreams when I was young was to photograph as much nature as possible to be able to fill my living room with colors from the different seasons of nature from different continents. Photographing is so beautiful in that way that you can show your perspective of things.
Other than that, I workout. A lot. It’s more of an interest rather than a passion, it’s important to note that. I train for a weightlifting club here in Stockholm. We saw a couple of days ago that I am above the qualifying points to be able to compete in the Swedish Weightlifting Competition. It’s important for me to have goals in any kind of thing that I love to do. It helps me stay focused in different states of mind.
If you had the chance to collaborate with any current artists/producers, who would be on that list?
Banks, Ryn Weaver, and Paul McCartney.
Ok, fun question time…what’s your go-to food of choice? Favorite movie or TV Show?
Tapas! Calamares makes my knees weak. I need to have my vote for ”Once upon a time in America” on that one. I’m a nerd when it comes to One Piece. One heartbreaking chapter there can completely ruin my whole week.
What are your plans for the rest of 2017 and beyond? What can the fans expect to see or hear from you?
Right now I’m a working to finish my upcoming EP. Still some things to do there, but hopefully it’ll be finished before the New Year! Might have some stuff there in-between!
