culture box

We see fresh talents all over. Talents who are dreaming of entering the spotlight and play music to a bigger crowd. For most artists in electronic music, the last year has of course been the most testing times of their careers. That is why we feel a responsibility to support some of the new crews in town that still haven’t had the attention for their work and commitment they deserve. 

Meet Sweetie. A collective we’re really going to keep an eye on. With their wish to spread the “Sweetie lifestyle” they are here to make their impact on the electronic music scene.

Hi, Sweetie! Please introduce yourselves to our readers.

First of all thank you very much for reaching out to us, it’s really an honour. Sweetie is a new music/event/dj collective based in Copenhagen and we’re hosting electronic music events in different variations in hope to spread the “Sweetie lifestyle” (more on that later). We’re four people in our collective: Cirkeline, a perfectionist dj and selector with a huge heart for microhouse and vinyls, and the one who brought us all together and formed Sweetie. Markus who is our creative graphic designer by day, but at night he turns into the stunning Minnie North, who you’ll meet at our events. Sofie aka Tusnelda who’s both a great selector and dj playing groovy house music, and our deco designer with an eminent sense of details and aesthetic expressions. Finally, Frederik aka Favør who’s a producer and dj serving the audience a big buffet of everything from deep house to minimal house to 90’s house. Enjoy!

Tell us how you met and why you teamed up as Sweetie?

Markus: Cirkeline was the one to come up with the idea that we should do something all together. We’ve all been working on different projects since we fell in love with electronic music and throwing parties. Therefore we all have different approaches, experiences and skills in relation to running a collective, and this makes us a good team. We all wanted to do something colourful and that’s how Sweetie started. 

What kind of musical direction can we expect when visiting your events?

Although having a broad music profile is one of our goals, it can’t be denied that we are all huge suckers for house music! At first the idea was to make a collective that was mainly going to throw microhouse parties, since the scene for this genre is not very big in Copenhagen. We quickly found out that our music profile should be more diverse as there are so many fine selectors and music makers we would like to book one day despite the genres they play. It’s a lot more fun when we can showcase different local talents, and don’t have to worry whether it suits our profile.

What’s your most important goal as a collective?

Sofie: We hope to be acknowledged for what we’re doing and to get the opportunity to work with artists that we love. We want to continue what we have been doing the first year, because we’re really proud of that. When we started we couldn’t have dreamt of a better first year. Our dream and goal is to make a mini festival in some rural part of Denmark, but for now we’ll keep hosting events in Copenhagen so people can get to know us. 

You started up during 2020, being a party collective. That must have been a challenge or what?

This might have been a good opportunity for us to be recognized, since the supply for these types of parties were short last summer. We were lucky to host two different parties at Boxland last summer, and in this case Corona might have been an advantage, since the events did not drown in the crowd of other parties happening at that same period.  

This quote from one of your Facebook posts made us curious: “We believe in long term sustainable solutions for both our environment and our human relations” with an aim to spread the ‘Sweetie’ lifestyle. Tell us more about that. What does that mean? 

Frederik: To us the “Sweetie lifestyle” is about taking care of the planet, each other and still doing what we love: produce music, dj and host events. Both as individuals and as a collective we’re all very conscious about how we live our lives in relation to minimizing our ecological footprint and to break down social barriers such as gender inequality and racism. It’s not an easy thing to do when our society is entangled in a fast growing tech industry, a relentless meat and dairy industry, a cheap travel culture, surveillance capitalism and a day-to-day fashion industry – just to name a few elements. To us all these things are connected and therefore we keep all these things in mind when we plan and create events, because we hope that we can bring people together without reproducing these existing norms. That’s the “Sweetie lifestyle”.

In the fall you hosted a talk about female representation and struggles on the electronic music scene with Anastasia Kristensen. Tell us about it. Why do you think there is a shortage of female producers and DJs on the electronic music scene?

Cirkeline: We wanted to make an informative event, and we felt like the time was right for a talk about this topic. Anastasia was really nice and said yes to come and have a chat with us, and she opened up about her experiences and thoughts on this issue in the industry. Personally, I think there is a shortage of female producers and dj’s because there aren’t enough role models for younger girls and women to look up to. Thankfully things are changing as the diversity is growing and more females are being represented in the scene. I believe this will encourage many different types of people to start playing themselves.

What is your hope for the clubscene in the future?

Less selfies and more diversity.

What kind of audience would you like to attract to your parties?

Everyone with a friendly mindset! We don’t pick or judge people by the way they look or dress (or don’t dress), but at the same time we only tolerate nice and respectful behaviour. Besides a friendly mindset, we really enjoy seeing new faces in the scene and people who are curious about “electronic music”. We hope we are able to introduce to others what we really love, and that everyone feels welcome no matter earlier experiences. 

Any specific parties to look forward to from you?

We’re doing a special live act event later this spring, which we’re very excited about. We can’t say so much yet, other than it will be both a visual and auditory experience. The event should have taken place in April but due to the newest restrictions we have to postpone it to later this Spring or Summer. Check out our SoMe for updates and more information.

Anything about Sweetie that you haven’t told us yet? 

We love meeting new people who are passionate about the same things as us, so reach out to us if you would like to collaborate!

Last question… Do you have a good advice for Culture Box once we’re back in business?

Keep supporting and booking local artists. There are so many talented producers and dj’s in Denmark right now in many different electronic music genres. Keeping an eye out for upcoming artists and giving them the opportunity to come play at the club is one of the really good values that we love about Culture Box. 

READ MORE:
👉 Read our LOCKDOWN Q&A WITH ANASTASIA KRISTENSEN about the effects of lockdown and the electronic music scene post the pandemic.

👉 Read our focus interview FOCUS: BGM8S. Despite the obstacles, the last year has been to all of us, BGM8S has continued to grow and expand their crew and activities.