Name: Patrik Kindvall aka Klur
Nationality: Swedish
Occupation: Producer
Current release: Klur's Visions is out via Colorize. Over the next months, several remixes of the album tracks will be released by the likes of Fejka, Matt Fax, Propellar and Polar Inc, among others. The Trilucid remix of “Between” is out now.
Recommendations: Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. It’s a timeless piece of art.

If you enjoyed this Klur interview and would like to know more about his music, visit him on Instagram, Facebook, and twitter.



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?

My passion for music was always there, but as a kid I didn’t have the patience to learn how to play an instrument properly.

When we first got our pc back in the 90s my big brother installed a music program on our computer, and we started to play around with it. I started to develop an interest for electronic dance music at the same time as I played around with producing music. I never went to a music school or anything like that.

It wasn’t until my twenties that I started focus on playing the piano properly which later helped me a lot in creating my own ‘sound’.

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?

When I make a track or I listen to a song I like I sometimes imagine a made up “scene”, place or music video in my head.

I choose the type of music to listen to depending on what my mood is at that moment. I need a lot of variety I don’t just listen to house music I listen to classical, soundtracks, ambient, pop, indie, jazz and all of them inspire me in different ways - sometimes it’s the sounds and sometimes it's harmony.

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

I think when you start out making music you need to copy other people’s music that you like in order to understand how it’s made technically. But after a while, when you become a more seasoned producer, I think you will automatically look for something that is missing in other music and that you feel could be improved according to your taste and that’s when you develop your own sound.

That what’s so cool about art, nobody has two exact identical tastes or preference. You just need to finetune what it is that makes your taste unique and it also changes with time.

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.

For me melody has always been at the forefront of the music I enjoy and prefer to make.

A new song must have an emotional connection with me when I make it in order for me to feel inspired and finish it. And the foundation is usually a chord progression of some kind on the piano.

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

Try to do something different from what is out there. It doesn’t have to be a lot but something that keeps the listeners interest to keep listening.

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”?

I used to be interested in making the “music of the future” but I realised that that music often has a very short shelf life.

I think timeless music comes from when you don’t try too much to achieve it but instead experiment and let the song go where it wants to go naturally instead of you forcing it where it should go from a preconceived idea.

But it’s a balance like everything else.

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?

I use Ableton Live as a DAW. I’ve tried most DAWs but Ableton has the easiest workflow for me.

80% of the foundation of my synth sounds comes from Diva and Serum. Lately I’ve been using more organic sounds in the form of field recording or percussion recordings with my portable microphone that I chop into rhythms and textures. That has been a great tool to start beat ideas when I feel uninspired.

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

I start off with a 10-20 min meditation. After that I have breakfast which is the same every day. Oatmeal, berries, yoghurt, granola and a coffee.

After that I usually start working. 3-4 times a week I go to the gym. I get about 4-8 hours of work done per day.

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

I wrote “Entangled” during a binge watch of the TV series “Le Bureau des Légendes” (English title ‘The bureau’) which is a great series about spies in France. But the story inspired me to write something on the piano based on the complicated relationship of the two main characters who are spies. That idea I turned into a melodic house track that became ‘Entangled’.

I also liked the idea of just having the piano on its own and it also has a bit of a cinematic feeling to it, I felt it would be great to release as a piano piece. So I thought of asking the composer Ole Björn Talstad to make his interpretation of it which he agreed to and it became even better.



That piece was added on Spotify’s biggest piano playlist and has close to 20 million streams now (8 months later).

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?

When I do song writing from scratch I always prefer to be alone. I think it's just a matter of me focusing better and playing around more freely when I’m alone in the studio.

But I’m not afraid of collaborating when I feel a track can become better with someone else’s ideas, sounds or vocals. It's super fun and I really enjoy hearing my track in a new way when somebody else put their touch to it.

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

I think music has the unique ability to transfer emotions and convey feelings as a universal language. It can be therapeutic, uplifting and inspirational in so many ways.

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 making can be therapy for me when I feel I need to ground myself through expression. As soon as music making becomes too much of a chore or a stressful thing I quit what I'm doing and I immediately think this is not the reason I make music. I then take a break and continue when I feel energised again. Music should come from joy and curiosity not from stress and I think that can be heard in the result.

There are also so many moments when other people's music has helped me feel better or given me inspiration and motivation to do the same for others that listen to my music.

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

The commonality I can think of is that working in both of these different fields takes a lot of time, research and practice before a result can be shown and both scientist and musicians are explorers trying to find something hidden.

Both are looking for something that does not yet exist.

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?

It's just different types of outlets. Everyone is different and music is just one of many ways to be creative. I used to think that I would be a designer for a while when I had given up on music. But I always came back and found the passion to make music again.

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?

The universe is fundamentally different frequencies (or call it vibrations if you want) interacting. Science explains that everything is made of frequencies.

So if our bodies and our brains are made of frequencies it makes sense that also emotions and thoughts are frequencies. Then of course music is frequencies or vibrations of the air molecules tuning into our brains.