WhoMadeWho at Sónar 2026: Three Hearts, One Wild Current

Some bands play together. WhoMadeWho seem to breathe through the same electric lung.

The Danish trio’s performance at Sónar 2026 is one of those sets that makes chemistry feel like a physical substance—something bright, elastic and alive enough to pour straight through the screen. Singer and bassist Tomas Høffding, drummer Tomas Barfod, and guitarist and vocalist Jeppe Kjellberg do not simply take turns leading. They pass the energy between them until the whole stage feels wired to one shared pulse.

ARTE Concert filmed the performance beautifully. The sound is muscular without becoming muddy, the camera work knows when to move and when to let a moment breathe, and the production captures the size of the show without losing the human connection at its center. Recorded during the trio’s June 20 appearance on the SonarVillage stage, the set marked WhoMadeWho’s first performance at the Barcelona festival since 2014, according to Sónar’s official program.

What we love most is the balance. The newer material arrives with fresh heat and sounds entirely at home beside the favorites. Then come the older songs—the anthems, the familiar sparks, the ones that make us cuckoo for their Cocoa Puffs—and the entire atmosphere lifts another few inches off the ground. Nothing feels arranged like a museum tour through the catalog. The old and new songs speak to one another, each one adding another color to a world WhoMadeWho have been building for more than two decades.

We saw them several years ago in San Francisco at a much smaller venue. We flew across the country because we knew the intimacy would be worth the trip, and it did not disappoint. It blew us away. There was a feeling in that room that the audience had stumbled into something too large to remain a secret forever.

Fast-forward a few years and the following has grown like wildflowers. The rooms are bigger, the stage language is more ambitious and the production now carries the scale of a genuine international movement. Yet the emotional center remains remarkably close. WhoMadeWho are still singing about love, togetherness, desire and hope as if those ideas might save the evening—and perhaps a little more than the evening.

Trying to place them inside one genre has never been especially useful. WhoMadeWho can move from soft love ballads to kick-you-in-the-face rock, stopping along the way for electronic propulsion, jazz-shaped freedom, psychedelic color and the kind of melodic glow that reaches the nervous system before the brain has time to label it. Høffding can turn a vocal into a flare in the night. Barfod gives the music its engine and electronic architecture. Kjellberg can make a guitar line feel tender in one breath and dangerous in the next. Together, they find a heavenly arrangement of sounds that moves through the soul like love itself.

And then there is the physical joy of it all. The trio understand that dance music is not only about tempo. It is about release. A rise of the shoulders. A room leaning forward together. A beat loosening whatever the day tied into knots. At Sónar, they control that current without strangling it. Every build feels intentional, but the pleasure remains gloriously free.

WhoMadeWho are often on the road, and their shows still feel like an invitation rather than a velvet-rope exercise. We highly recommend seeing the magic of this movement while the getting is good. Check the band’s official tour page for upcoming dates, then turn up the ARTE performance loud enough to give the walls a small emotional breakthrough.

This is one of our favorite bands of all time. Covering their music is not merely an assignment; it is a pleasure. At Sónar 2026, three musicians became one wild current, and we are still happily caught in it.

Written by Chetuno