Q&A: EmmaDop Re-emerges With Debut Album ‘Superstar’

Q&AMusic

Sep 16

☆ BY Lilah Phillips ☆

SOMETIMES, LIFE HAS A WAY OF DEALING US UNSUSPECTED CARDS — especially when you are on track to win the game. EmmaDop knows the feeling all too well. The unsettling anxiety kicks in as you are now faced with the uncertainty of the outcome. You ask yourself, “What happens now?” Just when you're ready to throw in the towel, that wild card that was hiding behind the others peaks from your peripheral and is that shiny glimmer of hope in the dark depths of that uncertainty you are faced with. Even when doubt creeps into your mind, you play the card anyway, revealing to you a solution. You can breathe easily again, navigate through obstacles, live life, and even embark on a new path. Even if it means you’ll face adversity again, it’s given you the strength to know that things will work out regardless — and EmmaDop has found their wild card.

Hailing from Aarhus, Denmark, EmmaDop returns with their first studio album, Superstar, which is accompanied by their lead singles “Love Has Run Wild” and “Crawling.” Composed of Line Ammitzbøll and Ole Kofoed Larsen, the duo’s pre-production for the album began as early as July 2021; the birth of Superstar began in their humble yet inviting kolonihavehus (allotment housing), which would be known as a simple garden shed to Americans, as they collaborated with acclaimed British producer Jonathan Quarmby.

The album consists of seven tracks that are encased with all the personal hardships the group faced this past year, particularly the uncertainty surrounding Ammitzbøll's concussion that almost ended their career before it could even begin. But after her healing, the duo is back stronger than ever, as Superstar is a perfect blend of energetic beats that carry a slight melancholic undertone. Paired with lively vocals and harmonies, they bring together the impactful story behind this album.

Read below to learn how EmmaDop took this dark circumstance and turned it into a Superstar.

LUNA: Hey there, Emmadop! How would you introduce yourselves to a new audience?

EMMADOP: We're a band called EmmaDop and we're from Denmark. Musically, we like to think our music is very based on good songwriting. We're very much into that with big songs and big choruses. The genre is kind of pop music, but we like to add lots of different stuff around those songs. So it's not like we’re only in one genre. It’s alternative rock-ish, and some of it is more mainstream pop

LUNA: What led to the creation of your album, Superstar?

EMMADOP: We make songs all the time and we had a bunch of songs that we wanted to get done and get the world to hear them. But unfortunately that came to a halt because I had a concussion for a year and I couldn't do anything. So, you know, life happened, and we ended up writing a lot of songs about that as well and turned it into this album, Superstar. Being sick for a year turned out to affect the songs a lot. Most of the topics in the lyrics are about getting back and getting through stuff together. Like, you have to experience life before you can get any success in life.

LUNA: What’s your creative process like?

EMMADOP: When we made this album, as mentioned before, we had some demos, some songs, and some ideas that were already done. So we just used to just jam a lot with the synth, bass, guitar, and a drum machine. It's very old-school. We just set up all our gear and then we just improvise, and Line likes improvising. We'll pick nonexisting words that sound a bit like English, sometimes Danish, and then we have usually 15 to 20 minutes of something that sounds like a song but isn't quite there yet. Then we listen to it and pick out parts that stick out, and then we put it together and somehow there's a song (laughs).

We had, like, 10 of those each, and then we got hooked up with an English producer named Jonathan Quarmby and he got in the process by helping us finish those songs that ended up being the album. So we met with him for a week in our summer house. Then he listened to them and said, “That's good on this, etc. We need to make this better. Should we use this word instead?” We wrote a lot of lyrics there, and he helped us with that and got the songs into the right place. So they worked and they got even closer to being finished. But the last part of the process has been emailing the songs back and forth. Just adjusting small things and then sending them to him. We also went to a studio in Copenhagen, where we recorded some drums and we had to be there every day and for a lot of hours. You just get into a nice, intense workflow with him. Then we finished the mixes ourselves. So we kind of put the last touches on the records.

LUNA: What two songs on the album do you guys feel you connect with the most?

EMMADOP: I can connect a lot with “Crawling” because it's about how I hit my head and was down and coming back from it. We both feel a special connection to it, both lyrically but also sonically. “Stupid” because it's kind of stupid (laughs). We just like that it's just for fun. And when we perform it live, we like to be in that mindset of just having fun and playing around, and we just get that feeling from that song.

LUNA: What message/goals do you hope to achieve with your music?

EMMADOP: When we perform, we like to start with our song “Stupid,” and there’s this feeling of setting people free. And you know, you can do whatever you want to do. You can feel free with your body, you can feel free with your mind, you can just play around. And not that it has to be silly all the time, but it’s the feeling of letting yourself go so they can be themselves. We like to lose control on stage, which is a bit harder while making an album because you have all the control. So on stage, we do make mistakes and like to mess up stuff. But we were trying to be creative with it and improvise our way out of mistakes. Not that we're fucking up all the time, but we like that there's a possibility to mess up. It gives us some kind of nerve, which is really important to us. It's okay to be who you are.

LUNA: Who or what inspires your sound?

EMMADOP: We listen a lot to Little Dragon, a band from Sweden, and Lana Del Rey. But, you know, we like to just put a record and then just let Spotify generate a playlist for us. It’s always a new surprise, and we've listened to a lot of radio hits, alternative, very mainstream pop, etc., and of course old music from the ’60s and ’70s and ’80s as well. We also have this rehearsal space we share with a lot of our friends and it's just kind of inspiring to be here. Because it's some shitty old rooms shared with the best people, and they're pretty inspiring to be around. Also, when you're in a rehearsal room and rehashing over the speakers, we tend to play very loud. And the music is very massive when you're playing in a small room. We've kind of grown up with that and played in a lot of small rooms. A lot of our songs actually have very massive explosions in the chorus. And I think that's because we're trying to find the same feeling that we have when we're playing it live in a small room.

LUNA: I saw that you guys would be performing in Olso, Norway Sept. 15–17, that must be exciting! What's your favorite thing about performing live?

EMMADOP: I think it's the mission of getting the audience to feel comfortable enough to want to jump or want to scream or want to cry. We think it's a little mission every time. You start with one song, and then the audience doesn't know who you are, and you have to get to know them and they have to trust you. It’s the connection between the songs, us, and the audience. And then we also just love to play around together. Ole likes to run around on stage with his guitar and we try to get people to loosen up, and you can totally feel when you’ve succeeded in that. It feels awesome that you've made some music and you have this attitude that makes people want to just stand up and jump!

LUNA: Any other plans for 2022?

EMMADOP: We have some shows in Denmark and we're releasing the album! We’re constantly writing new music. But currently, we don't really have any big things planned.

LUNA: Apart from music, any hobbies?

AMMITZBØLL: I like to be in my garden! You know, I just feel like plants are cool.

KOFOED LARSEN: I play basketball and sometimes take out my skateboard for a ride!

LUNA: Question for fun: What’s the most embarrassing fashion trend you used to rock?

KOFOED LARSEN: You know, we're not really into fashion (laughs). Well, I guess I used to wear very baggy jeans, like real skater boy–style. Maybe too baggy ’cause they would just fall down when you run (laughs).

AMMITZBØLL: Well, I had a lot of band merch I was wearing at the time so I guess that counts! (Laughs)

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We couldn’t be more stoked to have Suriel Hess as our new headliner for our upcoming LA show 🤩 🫶 Not gonna lie, us & Notorious Noise kinda went OFF with this line up & you’re not gonna wanna miss it - ticket link in bio 🎫