Of Monsters And Men - An Indie-Pop Fairy Tale

We caught up with the Icelandic band on a video call shortly before their concert at the amphitheater of the Pompeii excavations, as part of the Beats of Pompeii series. Singer and guitarist Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir answers our questions, telling us about the band's latest songs, the success of anthems like "Little Talks", and what lies behind the island of ice and fire's immense artistic potential.

Let's start right away with "Little Talks": did you expect it to become a hit?
Absolutely not. When we wrote our first album, we were a pretty new band, made up of friends who'd known each other for a long time and simply wanted to channel all their energy into music. After writing "Little Talks" we went to play at a pub in Iceland, sort of to get some general feedback on the other songs on the album too, but we didn't expect people to respond to that particular song the way they did — it was as surprising as it was magical.

Why title an album "All His Love And Pain In The Mouse Parade"?
It's a pretty "scary" title, as well as a long one. The Mouse Parade has several meanings for us. While we were writing the record, there were mice wandering around near our studio — the surrounding area had recently been demolished, so a lot of the time these creatures were trying to find a new habitat, somewhere warm to stay, and as a result they often came to visit us.

And how did you welcome them?
Let's just say it's not ideal to have mice in a studio wired up with cables everywhere, but being able to see them and interact with them in some way got us thinking about how we relate to nature, and how hard it can sometimes be to make everything intersect. They were just trying to escape the cold, so they tried to get in, and the song "Mouse Parade" is also about that need, while also exploring the deep connection between love and pain.

That came through in the lyrics of "My Head Is An Animal" too, your debut album. So where does the need to constantly explore this contrast between love and pain come from?
I think we've always been pretty obsessed as a band with that contrast. A song like "Little Talks", for example, sounds very happy, but the lyrics are actually pretty sad. It's about two people who no longer belong to the same world. These things have always been in our DNA.

Who is the "Kamikaze" you sing about in the song of the same name?
That one came out of a demo by Arnar, our drummer. I think metaphorically it's him.

Does every one of your albums follow a different process, or do you always work the same way?
Not really. If I think about "Fever Dream", it was actually quite difficult for us to play live, because that album has a more studio-based sound, with a lot of synthesizers and a denser production. Whereas with the latest album, for example, a large part of it was written so the whole band could perform it live. We didn't want the studio production to make it hard to play live afterwards. It was a conscious, deliberate choice.

Who are the monsters and who are the men in modern society?
Sometimes people think they're two separate things, but in reality that's not the case, because we human beings are terrible. We behave in a very monstrous way most of the time, and that's something that makes me really sad, so we are the monsters, as a species.

Why do old Icelandic tales so often end up at the heart of your songs?
I think it's something natural — it all started when we were first becoming a band. For me and Ragnar it was also a way to write together, since old stories have always brought us close. But more generally, Icelandic stories are part of who we are; in Iceland we all grew up listening to them. My grandfather, for instance, used to tell me all these ghost stories. And I was so fascinated by them, since they're mystical and magical at the same time. They're stories that also show how the world is actually a bit more complex than it seems. And I also find it even more fascinating that these songs end up being played at friends' weddings — it's a wonderful connection.

Sigur Rós, Björk, and we could go on for hours: Iceland is small, yet it has given the world world-famous musicians. What's the secret?
I think we Icelanders are basically very creative people; here it's very common to be a creative type, or rather an unwitting artist. Like my grandmother, who probably wouldn't say she's an artist, yet she carves these incredible figures out of stone and puts them all over the house and in the garden, and I tell her: "Do you know you're an artist?" But she just does it because she enjoys it, and I think our bond with being musicians, or with any other kind of art, is something innate. You could ask any Icelander and they'd tell you: "I'm doing this, not because I want to be successful or become an artist, but simply because I need to." That, basically, is the mindset of the Icelandic people, and it will probably always have a big impact everywhere.

What are your musical influences?
There are so many it's hard to say, and each of us has different ones too. For me, for instance, it's definitely John Prine: I love his music and his wonderfully brazen lyrics, the way he writes amazes me and inspires me in some way. And then there's always something special about playing back home, in Iceland — I'd definitely say our homeland influences our songs more than any other music does.

Does AI scare you?
I like it — well, I think it's no surprise that some musicians think, "Oh, it's amazing." Personally, I think it's terrible for the planet, and I just don't understand the need to hand an art form like music over to computers. We'll soon realize we're making huge mistakes. I just read that even here in Iceland a lot of people are being laid off because of artificial intelligence — a lot of software engineers are losing their jobs. So what will we do with our time? It's an increasingly strange and unsettling world.

(July 12, 2026)

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