Our All Buttoned Up community has grown rapidly during the last months and we are very thankful for that! In this series ‘Rude Roots’ we are asking our own community about their lives, their passion and love for alternative culture, music, art, and other stories. We continue this series with Swedish Mima. She’s a DJ playing in several clubs in Sweden and we talked about culture, pop music, and Taylor Swift.
Introduction
Hi Mima! Thank you so much for participating in this interview with us. How are you?
Hi! I’m fine! Tired, but still excited after the clubs this weekend!
© Instagram of Mima
Growing up
Could you tell us a little bit about how you grew up Sweden and your life back then? How’s the culture there?
I’m from a really small town up north. It’s beautiful, but very cold, dark and it didn’t have any alternative clubs when I was growing up, so the first thing I did as 19 was to move to Malmö in the south and go to all pop clubs eight days a week! Then I moved around and up north to Umeå, but now I’m finally back in Malmö, but on the other side of the DJ booth!
© Instagram of Mima
Subculture
How did you come into contact with different subcultures? Where your friends a big influence on you, or you just walked into a bar or venue by yourself and got yourself exposed to a lot of things?
I have always been obsessed with music and as I said we didn’t have any good clubs and barely no internet, so I bought and borrowed CDs from the library and friends and made my own mixtapes which I insisted should be played at the party’s haha..
What kind of music did you listen back in the days? Did your taste in music change when you became older?
It was mostly classic bands like Cure, Smiths and Beatles, but also a lot of Swedish indie pop bands! I still have the same taste in guitar music, but now I’m listening through new bands every day, but I’m always coming back to Cure, Beatles, Felt, Comet Gain, Replacements and.. Taylor Swift. Good song writing is good song writing 🙂
DJ-career
Tell us when you started out as a DJ.
I started 10 years ago and then it wasn’t many, barely any, female DJs up north, and I never thought about it as a possibility. But then the DJ was sick at our university club and they asked if I would try and I did and I’m sure it was a terrible mess, but I loved it from the first second! A few months later I had my own club at Umeå’s best venue Scharinska!
Fortunately, nowadays women are way more common (as it should be) in the music scene, but it wasn’t always like that. Do you feel comfortable and respected in the whole music scene you are in?
Through the years I have felt both quoated and underpayed as a female, but now I’m in a very good place where I feel respected!
© Instagram of Mima
You became a sort-of household DJ performing at Plan B in Malmo. Right? Tell us more about those nights…
Yes, I have lived in Malmö for like one and a half year now and I moved here during pandemic, so it felt like the whole scene was over. But now I have montly indie club nights at both Plan B and Grand, my favorite venues! And a whole new generation is filling the floors and it just fills me with the biggest happiness haha.. It truly feels like Malmö is Sweden’s number one pop club city now!
What does the Fred Perry culture mean for you? When did you start wearing it?
For me it just unites a lot of subcultures and I guess I had the same taste in clothes since I was a teen, but then it was the same as with the music, it wasn’t easy to find. So now as an adult I think I have built a timeless waredrobe where I can show my passion in a classy way!
© Instagram of Mima
Are there other brands you feel a connection with?
I also love some other classic brands like Sunspel, Gloverall, Dr Martens, Levi’s etc!
Future
What are your plans for this year?
My plan is to keep finding new music to my clubs and also start a new one i March! A dream would be to DJ in England too!
© Instagram of Mima
Final question: anything you would like to add to the readers and followers of All Buttoned Up? 🙂
You can follow Mima87 on Spotify to see what I listen to 🙂
If you would like to support Mima you can folllow her on Instagram or follow her on Spotify.
All content used in this article is shared with consent of the creator.
Very cool interview! Keep it going!