Listen to Feel

I met Isak in his home studio south of Stockholm to chat about music, music and more music. He studies music at the Royal Academy of Music, works in a music plug-in company, mixes and masters songs, creates and produces music for others and for himself.

As a kid, he dreamed of becoming a guitarist and going on tour. Led by passion, interest and talent, he centered his life around music. In the process, he also started to understand that the touring life might be very difficult to achieve and sustain. But what else is there to do if you don’t aim for the big stage? “I'm behind the curtains all the time, and I like it there”, he says while radiating confidence and joy about the position he is in.

By only 13 years old, Isak had already participated in years of instrumental training. Starting out with piano and singing in a choir, he transitioned to the guitar, adding percussion and drums soon after and finally, tying all skills together through music production. Jazz trained, electronic passionate - a combination that benefits him all too well today.
We’re sitting in a small square room filled with all kinds of production gear, instruments and a DJ table. He sits on the twisting turning producer chair, I get to rest on a wobbly plastic chair. The fact that his big laptop screen is on and displays his list of unread e-mails paints a funny yet accurate contrast: being a musician cannot be chaos and creativity all the time. You gotta learn to be structured to manage yourself and your career like that. And you only got one desk to sit on.

For Nova, he creates compositions within jazz, ambient and electronics - check out his work on “honypie” or “Lestlie More”. Additionally, he mixes in Dolby Atmos to expose the full spatial audio potential of selected songs.

He tells me that this is exactly where he wants to be. Hard to imagine, a childhood dream about being a touring musician ends in happiness about creating background music? He elaborates on how he got into this mind space.

In modern musical artistry, visuals and branding are non-negotiable. It might even be a prioritized element of it. But it’s actually only some genres in pop culture that require it. In the niche of mood music, creators find their creative freedom behind a pseudonym.

Isak is one of the people who successfully made it into the industry, making music full time and never having to market it in common ways. “And that's really nice with Nova because you can do music because you love to make music”, he points out. Isak is inspired by the inner world. Songs leave an impression on him if they connect to a memory, a feeling. To express his own emotions is what drives him to create.

This reflects in his musical process: mix consoles that enable him to “draw” sound (manipulate it freehandedly and not mathematically or digitally), plenty of real instruments - he created a working space that allows him to turn away from the screen, forget about technicalities and compose led by intuition and ear. He dives deep into the music he creates. “When I started out with ambient music, I had the playlist [I wanted to land] on 24/7 to get into the headspace of the sound, of the vibe. To know what it should feel like when I compose it later”.

When I hear him talk about his musical process, I already become nostalgic over it - thinking about how AI has the potential to create somewhat similar outcomes, just without the heart and soul going into it.
Isak shares his awe of what’s possible nowadays: the tools are impressive and he’s not shy to say it. The opportunities for creation are endless, it might be able to do something that you can’t or don’t have access to. “Everyone can create a fun happy birthday song in country style, I think it’s fun”, he says and laughs, pointing out the playful side of it. But where is his mind at when it comes to his own creations?

“Never”, he says. “I feel like the most fun part about making music is making it. I feel it's destroying the purpose of the thing you want to do”. And yes, that feels aligned with the musical persona he seems to be.

To summarize, Isak is a hustler that is dedicated to making his dream happen and he talks about it lightheartedly. But we know better - it must take a lot. Learning several instruments at a young age, studying music production at a Royal Academy while working for a plug-in company, writing mood music for Nova, previous jobs in commercial music for a startup, sound design, mixes for spatial audio for all kinds of artists and musicians and oh yeah he also has a band that plays live gigs in vibrant, gritty bars in town. A resume to look up to, and that at only 25 years old. It is people like him that make me believe that it is possible to make your dream your reality and that there are places that will support you in that. ■