Stephan Kunze on Curating Zen Sounds, Deep Listening Habits, the German Lofi Hip Hop Scene and his Journey as a Journalist and Editor at Spotify

https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Podcasts123/v4/50/8b/a2/508ba2fb-0f5d-c9cb-5d36-c7a784aa0aa0/mza_17290596305314971855.jpg/600x600bb.jpg

Fox Tales - a music industry podcast by Stereofox

Stereofox

27 episodes

1 week ago

Exploring the music industry one episode at a time. Welcome to Fox Tales - a music industry podcast by Stereofox. This will serve as documentation of our learnings as a curator and record label. Excited to share music, artist success stories, best practices when it comes to building your brand and grow as an independent musician and talk about the latest in music tech, digital marketing, and creativity.

Music Commentary

Music

RSS

All content for Fox Tales - a music industry podcast by Stereofox is the property of Stereofox and is served directly from their servers with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.

Music Commentary

Music

https://d3t3ozftmdmh3i.cloudfront.net/production/podcast_uploaded_episode400/9885866/9885866-1672920011339-4f1ff1ee7dc58.jpg

Stephan Kunze on Curating Zen Sounds, Deep Listening Habits, the German Lofi Hip Hop Scene and his Journey as a Journalist and Editor at Spotify

Fox Tales - a music industry podcast by Stereofox

1 hour 10 minutes

2 years ago

Stephan Kunze on Curating Zen Sounds, Deep Listening Habits, the German Lofi Hip Hop Scene and his Journey as a Journalist and Editor at Spotify

Stephan Kunze is a German music journalist and author, radio host, editor and curator with over 20 years of experience.

He currently curates Zen Sounds - a newsletter dedicated on ambient, jazz and experimental music. Stephan’s colourful experience - from print to radio and now digital streaming makes him really interesting and multi-layered guest.

Previously Stephan was Global Editorial Lead at Spotify, had his own imprint (Heart Working Class), consultant for Red Bull, editor-in-chief for the German hip hop magazine Juice, and writer for Berlin-based Spex (to name a few).

Links

» Zen Sounds newsletter

» Zen Sounds IG (@zen__sounds)

» Stereofox IG (@wearestereofox)

» subscribe for our newsletter at Stereofox.com

» listen to our label releases

» host (@himynameisivo)

» Join our Discord Server

Podcast notes

[01:50] intro, earliest music memories and buying records in the 90s

[06:10] degree in law and first writing experiences for SPEX and Juice

[09:10] music journalism in the 2000s and interviewing Pharrell Williams and working at Juice

[14:50] curating a newsletter (Zen Sounds) vs running a magazine or curating editorial playlists at Spotify

[19:00] switching Zen Sounds to English

[22:15] staying consistent and motivated when it comes to creating content

[23:40] Living in Berlin, the Pandemic, and staying balanced

[29:10] the Deep Listening philosophy and impact on life

[33:10] building listening habits as a listener and Spotify playlist editor

[36:50] today’s consumption of music and art and the future of the attention economy in mainstream media

[38:45] how to build a career and audience as an artist and be successful on Spotify and the state of lofi music

[42:30] singles vs albums when it comes to lofi hip hop

[45:20] the story and growth of the German hip hop beat scene

[49:40] Stephan path’s in Spotify and the evolution / creation of editorial playlists

[52:10] the culture of lofi hip hop

[54:45] are music publications still relevant, social media and does audience size matters

[1:06:20] 2022 end-of-year lists, the Zen Sounds newsletter, and future plans