Restaurant music: how to choose a playlist that matches your concept

Alongside his club work, Soberboy curates music for five-star hotels and restaurants in Dubai. He is direct about how most venues handle it. I asked him why he keeps comparing a playlist to a plate of food.

Why do you compare music to food?

Because in a good restaurant nothing reaches the guest by accident. The ingredients are chosen carefully, the dish is arranged with attention, the timing is planned, and someone tastes the food before it leaves the kitchen. Music is served to the same guest for the entire length of the meal, and in most restaurants nobody has ever listened to it properly. Somebody found a playlist online and pressed play, and that becomes the sound of the room for the whole evening.

If you would not serve a dish that you had never tasted, you should not play music that you have never sat and listened to.

Does the quality of the recording really make a difference?

It makes a considerable difference, and it is more noticeable in a quiet restaurant than in a club. Music with a harsh treble makes people tense without their understanding why. Music with an unclear bass makes conversation tiring, and guests who find it difficult to talk will ask for the bill earlier. Large jumps in volume between one track and the next make the whole room feel badly managed.

The version of a song also matters. A radio edit with a loud vocal belongs in a different kind of venue. A longer instrumental version leaves space for people to talk while still setting the mood.

How closely should the music follow the concept of the restaurant?

The music is part of the concept rather than a decoration added at the end. A dark, minimal Japanese restaurant should not be playing the same music as a Mediterranean terrace at sunset. The lighting, the plates, the uniforms and the music should all express one idea, and a guest should be able to sense that idea without anyone explaining it to them.

When the music contradicts the concept, guests rarely complain about it. They simply do not come back, and the restaurant never learns the reason.

You often say that the chef and the DJ are on the same journey. What do you mean?

A menu has a shape. It begins with something light, then builds, then reaches a main course, and then allows the guest to relax. A service has a shape too. There is the arrival, the room filling up, the busiest part of the evening, and then the later hours when people are drinking rather than eating. The music has to move along with that shape.

Early in the evening you are creating a mood and helping people settle. As the restaurant fills, you raise the energy gradually so that a busy room feels intentional rather than chaotic. Later, once most of the food has been served, you can open the music up and allow the evening to become something livelier. If the music stays the same all night, it is working against the kitchen instead of with it.

How do you raise the energy without turning a restaurant into a club?

You raise it through rhythm rather than through volume. A firmer beat, a warmer bass line and more movement in the music will make a room feel more alive even when the volume has barely changed. Reaching for the volume control is the common mistake, because it only makes everybody shout and shortens the evening.

It also helps to keep a degree of mystery. Guests should not be able to name every track they hear. As soon as a room recognises the playlist, the atmosphere stops belonging to that restaurant and starts to feel generic. The music should be familiar enough to feel comfortable and unfamiliar enough to feel special.

What mistakes do you see most often?

Allowing staff to change the music, so that the mood changes with every shift. Using a free streaming account that plays advertisements and then shuffles into something unsuitable. Using a single playlist from opening until closing. Playing chart songs with explicit lyrics in a room full of families. Finally, ignoring the equipment, because carefully chosen music played through two small speakers above the bar will leave half of the room in silence and the other half unable to talk.

What should a restaurant owner do first?

Sit in your own restaurant through a full service and listen instead of eating. Notice the moments when the music stops matching what is happening in the room. Then decide how the restaurant should feel at seven o’clock, at nine o’clock and at eleven o’clock, and prepare three different sets of music rather than one. That single change will put you ahead of most venues.

When is it worth hiring someone to do this properly?

When the experience itself is what you are selling, and guests are choosing you for the evening as a whole rather than only for the food. At that point the music deserves the same attention as the menu. It should be programmed by someone who does this professionally, updated regularly, and set up in a way that your team cannot change by accident.

Adding a resident DJ to your restaurant programme

If the venue needs recurring live sets as well as playlists, use the Dubai resident DJ hiring guide to define service times, musical fit, a trial night and technical responsibilities. For the wider programme, send your restaurant music brief. The Cavo / Sound of Tulum project describes Soberboy’s resident-DJ role and the team’s work on DJ bookings, food menu, layout and venue design.