Why top restaurants are rethinking the soundtrack to fine dining

Tom JenkinsMon, May 11, 2026 at 8:00 AM UTC

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Fine-dining restaurants such as Punk Royale in Stockholm are increasingly using music to set the scene for their menu. Jack Tornqvist, Punk Royale (aol_national_geographic_989)

This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK).

It’s the end of another steamy night in Bangkok, and at Gaggan restaurant in Sukhumvit, everyone is on their feet singing. All 14 guests, along with the restaurant team and chef-owner Gaggan Anand, are joined in the guilty pleasures act of belting out the Backstreet Boys classic I Want It That Way.

A shameless, full-volume singalong is not an unusual finale to a big night out but it’s one rarely associated with leading restaurants such as Gaggan — a one-Michelin-star establishment named Best Restaurant in Asia 2025 by the World’s 50 Best Restaurants. But across the globe, a not-so-quiet revolution is taking place in white tablecloth establishments, where music is being used to fundamentally alter the fine dining experience. It’s out with stiff linens and lounge jazz, and in with Eighties rock, hard punk and boy bands. Let’s call it ‘fun dining’.

“Music is the first step to breaking the barrier between me and my guest,” says Anand, who serves a thinly sliced asparagus shaped to look like a sunflower, paired with Sunflower, the 2018 hit song by Post Malone and Swae Lee. The rest of the soundtrack for the multi-course meal, which pumps out of a pricey sound system, is more ambiguous. George Michael and Radiohead are woven in harmoniously, but Anand also hits guests with heavy blasts of American rock band Tool before they’ve taken their first bite, to awaken their senses, and what Anand dubs an “incredible punk band” called Otoboke Beaver.

“It’s extremely uncomfortable to eat if you don’t like punk. So, I’m always pulling and pushing. It’s like bungee jumping, like a rollercoaster,” says Anand, who softens the playlist as the meal unfolds.

DJ Jacob Kelly spins vinyl live from his booth in the kitchen at Ynyshir in Wales. Fredrik Skogkvist, Punk Royale

DJ Jacob Kelly spins vinyl live from is booth in Ynyshir's kitchen in Wales. Eleonora Boscarelli

The use of sound to affect sensory perception at high-end restaurants has been gaining momentum in recent years. The signature Sound of the Sea dish at The Fat Duck in Bray, England, involves listening to beach sounds on headphones whilst eating seafood and edible sand to invoke freshness and nostalgia for seaside holidays. Then there are fully immersive multi-sensory experiences like the now-shuttered Ultraviolet in Shanghai where all the senses are stimulated at once to alter flavour perception. Studies have suggested that sound alone can affect our perception of sweetness, bitterness, saltiness and umami.

However, this is not the intention at Gaggan and other restaurants of its ilk. Nor are they the kind of DJ-led, beach club-style spots with mediocre food that litter holiday resorts. Chefs at the world’s best restaurants have realised that an easy way to make fine dining more up-to-date and enjoyable is to start with a banging playlist. And all they’re asking patrons to do is to undo their top button and embrace it.

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“You arrive at this fine-dining restaurant as a lawyer, say, from a white-collar job from a big city”, says Anand. “And you can leave all that behind. Suddenly you’re at Coachella. Restaurants are supposed to be social.”

Five restaurants putting the fun into fine dining1. Punk Royale, Sweden

Having begun life in Stockholm, one of the world’s wildest dining experiences has branched out into the Nordics and reached as far as London, too, bringing caviar bumps, topless waiters, smoke machines and a no-phones policy to the fine dining arena. The music, played at ear-splitting volume, veers from hip-hop and techno to singalong pop, but the food is no gimmick: there’s serious fine-dining credibility in dishes such as chawanmushi (Japanese egg custard) with caviar and chicken wing jus.

2. Da Terra, UK

At East London’s two-Michelin-star Da Terra, chef Rafael Cagali and team have built a collaborative playlist of mainly Eighties classics from the likes of The Cure, New Order and The Pretenders that sits in pleasing juxtaposition to the elegant Brazilian-Italian cuisine, with dishes like red mullet with ajo blanco, tomato and basil, and polished service. The idea, says Cagali, is to make the experience “more human and less ceremonial”.

At El Chato in Bogotá, every meal is accompanied by a carefully curated soundtrack. El Chato

Chef Rafael Cagali and his team at Da Terra in London use collaborative playlists to bring a more human touch to fine dining. Kira Turnbull3. El Chato, Colombia

El Chato, named Latin America’s Best Restaurant in 2025, offers a tasting menu experience with a soundtrack that’s as energetic as the kitchen team and chef Álvaro Clavijo himself. The ever-changing playlist at this Bogotá pioneer veers from the likes of Tupac to INXS to African and Brazilian music, played at a volume that matches the punchy flavours in dishes like sea snail with golden berries, chicharrón and seaweed.

4. Gaggan, Thailand

Chef Gaggan Anand has been experimenting with music as part of the fine-dining experience for close to a decade. At the original iteration of his Bangkok restaurant, he would create dishes directly inspired by songs, such as ‘Lick It Up’ led by a Kiss song, where diners would be encouraged to lick the course directly from the plate. At time of writing, he is planning to briefly close and reopen his restaurant with a whole new experience — a ‘journey’ of 28 courses incorporating music and chakras.

5. Ynyshir, Wales

A meal at two-Michelin-star Ynyshir in Machynlleth, in Mid Wales, unfolds over five or so hours, with diners treated to 30-plus courses of largely Asian-inspired, mostly small bites. All the while, DJ Jacob Kelly brings some serious VIP club energy to the small dining room, spinning everything from hip-hop to house (he never plays the same set twice), from his booth just inside the open kitchen. He and chef Gareth Ward have even released a vinyl of one of the sets, with another release planned soon.

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