Tag: Múm

From Family Time to Me Time, Here’s How Moms Say They’re Using Music and Podcasts

May 8, 2020

Mother’s Day is always a special time, yet this year the occasion—and motherhood in general—looks a little different. That’s why Spotify asked more than 3,000 moms in Australia, Canada, and the U.S. how they’re navigating the new normal and how music and podcasts are playing a role. As it turns out, audio content is truly helping moms make the most of family time. 

Of mothers surveyed, 78% have used music to connect with their kids in the past month, while a third say they’ve listened to podcasts with their kids for fun, education, or even as a break from screen time. Case in point: Story Pirates, a podcast featuring stories by kids for kids, has seen a 39% boost in Spotify streams since March. 

That’s not all we found. From dance parties to moments of meditation, here’s how moms are using music and podcasts to get through their days.

Multitasking master

When it comes to multitasking, no one does it quite like moms. A whopping 81% of those surveyed say they’re juggling at least one other task while streaming their favorite music or podcasts. The most popular activities? Chores, cooking, or working out. Looking for something new to stream while multitasking? Check out the “Listening Together” artist-created playlists in our Home Hub to find music for any task.

Movin’ and groovin’

At-home dance parties are the perfect way to shake off stress, get in some exercise, and boogie down with your quarantine cohorts. More than 40% of moms said they’ve started dance parties in the last month on their own or with their families. Our Dance Pop playlist has the hits you need to get the party started.

Can’t get you out of my head

Mom’s genre of choice? For 38% it’s pop, while 14% are rocking out to rock, and 13% are riding off into the sunset with country jams. Plus, since quarantine began, 30% of moms report having a catchy earworm stuck in their heads. Some of those songs include “Savage” by Megan Thee Stallion, “When I Was Your Man” by Bruno Mars,” Adore You” by Harry Styles,” Thinking Out Loud” by Ed Sheeran, and “Raise Your Glass” by P!nk!.

Grrrl power 

If you had your very own podcast, who would your dream cohost be? For the moms surveyed, 35% said it would be their own mom, BFF, or grandma. If you’re looking for a parent-child duo for inspiration, check out fashion designer Cynthia Rowley’s show Ageless, cohosted by her daughter Kit.

Dancing on my own 

Yet besides using music and podcasts to spend time with family, many moms are also turning to their favorite music to get some much-needed alone time. More than half of those surveyed said they’re over listening to the content their kids want to listen to—and that they’ve used music to tune out their families. To get away, about a third of moms say they’re escaping to their bedrooms to listen to music or opting for a solo walk. Some moms (34% of respondents) say they’ve hopped in the car to drive to nowhere just to blast a few songs in solitude. If the windows-down, wind-in-your-hair vibe sounds like your thing, we’ve got a playlist just for that. Another option for Spotify Premium Family Plan subscribers is Spotify Kids, which allows children to explore audio with you or on their own—or enjoy kid-friendly audio handpicked for them.

All the feels 

It’s probably no surprise that moms (like many of us) are just taking things one day at a time. According to 67%, that’s how they’ve handled these past few weeks. Meanwhile, 30% described their mood as “frustrated,” another 30% said they were “anxious,” and 35% said they’ve cried along to a song in the last month. At this unprecedented time, it’s important that those who take such good care of their families also take care of themselves. Moms can check out Daily Wellness for a personalized mix of motivational podcasts, and feel-good music can help create a little “me time” in their routines.

 

Whether they’re singing loud and proud or taking it easy with their favorite chill tracks, one thing’s for sure: Moms are rock stars.

That’s why this Mother’s Day, we created a playlist to celebrate and thank moms for all their hard work year-round. Between enjoying some alone time, cooking for your family, or dancing on your own, the Mother’s Day 2020 playlist has a little something for you.

Stream the Mother’s Day 2020 playlist below and have a happy Mother’s Day!

How ‘Joker’ Composer Hildur Guðnadóttir Ventured From Iceland’s Underground to Hollywood’s Red Carpet

April 6, 2020

When For the Record connected with Hildur Guðnadóttir at her Berlin home, it was a few months after the Icelandic composer had accepted the Best Original Score Oscar for her soundtrack to Todd Phillips’ anti-hero epic, Joker.

On its own, the Oscar win would be a life-altering event, but for Guðnadóttir, it’s merely the exclamation point for a remarkable awards-season run. It’s not just her iconic work for Joker that’s earning her trophies—her score for the 2019 HBO miniseries Chernobyl netted her an Emmy and a Grammy. Essentially, in six short months, this unassuming artist from Iceland’s avant-garde fringes has swiftly moved three quarters of the way to an EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony).

But for those who’ve been following Guðnadóttir’s career for the past 15 years, the most amazing thing about her Oscar win isn’t that she’s the first Icelander to ever win an Academy Award, or that she’s only the fourth female composer to take home the statue. It’s that she’s the first Oscar winner who has also collaborated with electro-punk provocateurs The Knife, industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle, and experimental metal band Sunn 0))). 

From a young age, Guðnadóttir was positioned to pursue a composing career—her father is a clarinetist who leads a chamber ensemble, and her mother is an opera singer. But if Guðnadóttir’s parents provided her with the tools and training to become a musician, Guðnadóttir found her true artistic calling when, as a teen, she fell in with the ’90s Reykjavik indie music scene—a close-knit, creative community that spawned the groove ensemble GusGus, post-rock maestros Sigur Rós, and electronic experimentalists Múm (with whom she’d become an on-again, off-again member over the years).

“When we were starting out, none of us really saw any career opportunities in music,” Guðnadóttir recalls. “None of us started to make music because we thought we could live off of it. We were just making music to hang out with each other. So there was a lot of exploration that happened through that.” By the mid-2000s, Guðnadóttir had moved beyond the Reykjavik scene to become part of a global community of artists blurring the lines between neoclassical composition, found-sound experimentation, and post-rock grandeur. On top of establishing her own solo career, Guðnadóttir had become an in-demand session player for boundary-pushing artists like Nico Muhly, Ben Frost, and Pan/Sonic. But her forays into film scoring were abetted by another Icelandic native: the late Jóhann Jóhannsson. 

Best known for soundtracking Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario and Arrival (on which Guðnadóttir performed), Jóhannsson was instrumental in building the bridge between Hollywood and the avant-garde that Guðnadóttir would later traverse. “We came from basically the same scene in Iceland,” Hildur said of her long-time collaborator, who passed away suddenly in 2018 at age 48. “Then we started working together in 2003. He was super influential in opening people’s ears in Hollywood. He did an incredible job of bringing more inaccessible sounds to film-scoring.”

As Guðnadóttir has attracted more high-profile projects, Jóhannsson’s influence on her work has become more evident, especially when it comes to her methods for capturing those “inaccessible sounds.” Her approach to Chernobyl was not so much to complement a scene as seep inside of it, building her unsettling score from field recordings captured inside Lithuania’s decommissioned Ignalina Power Plant (where the series was shot) and investing her dread-ridden drones with a degree of claustrophobic unease.

“Radiation is such a strong character in the story, and I thought it was really important that the music was the radiation … I basically tried to make a musical instrument out of a nuclear power plant, and really root the music in the facts of this story.”

Naturally, a fictional work like Joker demanded a considerably different treatment. “The music has more space to make bigger statements,” she said. The results are no less effective, and Guðnadóttir’s Joker score—all trembling cellos and marauding percussion—deftly mediates between the melancholy and the frightening.

Needless to say, no one was more surprised by the score’s success than Guðnadóttir, but her journey from the underground to the red carpet has been a pleasant experience. Even before her award wins firmly established her as one of Hollywood’s most in-demand composers, the Icelandic outsider found a welcoming scene in L.A. not entirely unlike the one that nurtured her in Reykjavik. 

“I imagined Hollywood to be this competitive world, but I’ve been so wonderfully surprised to see a sense of community between film composers—people seem to be really happy to support each other’s work and cheer each other on.”

Tune into This Is Hildur Guðnadóttir to experience the avant-garde composer’s Oscar-winning scores.