Where are you based?
I’m from Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa (New Zealand) but I live in Berlin, Germany.
Where do you work? What do you do?
I work for Ableton, a company that designs music software and hardware for producers and performers. I’m responsible for music and artist partnerships, which essentially is about finding and sharing inspiring real life examples of what’s possible with our products with music fans.
What are you listening to?
My listening is all over the show. From radio to mixtapes to albums to Dinosaur Train songs on repeat (thanks to my son). Right at this moment, I’m listening to “A Guide to Classical Works in Murakami Novels” on NTS Radio. Yesterday, on a walk, I was listening to the new album from Jim Legxacy. At the gym the other day, I listened to the same three tracks from the new Jung Kook album for 40 minutes because apparently I’m a psychopath when I work out.
How do you discover new music?
I think this question might be the meaning of my life. I know you’re asking me practically how; places and websites, but for me discovery is a real state of mind I have to foster. I went through a long “listening block” a few years back where I didn’t feel open to hearing anything new. This is maybe one of the side effects of working in music and being a music fan, you can get pretty fatigued about staying “on it”. Now, I make space in my mind to be open, to follow my curiosity naturally and let music find me.
So on the more practical side, new music finds me in lots of different ways. My top two places of discovery: radio (NTS, The Lot, Radio New Zealand) and people (my partner, a couple music mad friends, other curation colleagues). I think radio makes the top two because it’s essentially just more recommendations from people, just outside my direct network. I also read a lot of Wikipedia “liner notes” on albums and releases, and really dig into the samples, writers and producers. Genius notes can also be really great for discovery, I often find myself going down an interpolation wormhole. Same thing on Youtube, if I let the algorithmic wave take me where it wants to go.
What formats do you usually listen to? LP, CD, Cassette, Digital, Streaming Services? Why?
I listen to a lot of music online. I’m currently using Tidal after cancelling my Spotify subscription for the 10th time. I’m still trying to settle on a streaming service that doesn’t make me feel a lack of solidarity with musicians, but is also functional. I stream a lot on Bandcamp, either my own collection or the collections of people I follow. I still buy music, in particular stuff I really like and listen to a lot on streaming, I’ll quite often buy the LP of it (and get gifted the digital alongside). This is a nice balance for me, to still have a physical collection alongside a big collection of playlists across streaming services and youtube. Physical music always feels like such a nice ritual, when you wake up on a Sunday, make coffee and pull out an album; it’s a much more fun and intimate experience.
“for me, music discovery is a real state of mind I have to foster. I make space in my mind to be open, to follow my curiosity naturally and let music find me.”
Where do you do most of your music listening?
I would say I listen to most of my music when I’m on the go, so through my ear buds. If I’m at home, we’ll listen to stuff on our bluetooth speaker or put a record on. I also listen a lot at work, but that can be a different type of listening. When I listen to music for work, it’s not necessarily about what I personally like or don’t like, but about the production and execution in relation to what we’re working on. Most of the time that’s through over ear headphones or through monitors.
How do you find and listen to pre-release music?
Pre-release music is normally sent to me, either as a download, a stream or an Ableton file. Soundcloud is still big for these kinds of previews. People still send a lot of CDs, which I can’t really listen to anymore but I’m always grateful for.
What are your frustrations with listening to music digitally? Any benefits?
As someone who went from listening to tapes to CDs to mini-disc to MP3 player to iPod to the infinite world of smartphone + streaming, I have to say organising music is a pain in the ass. I also don’t necessarily want unlimited access, I find constraint comforting, and sometimes the endless playlists and scrolling of streaming services can leave me paralysed for choice. In some ways I found it easier to discover when the choices weren’t so infinite.
Also anyone who receives a lot of promo tracks will tell you it’s the worst thing ever when they’re not labelled or tagged properly. Quite often I will throw these in a big folder then listen on my phone while I’m walking and I’ll look at the track and there’s just a track name, no artist or label, and I have to reverse engineer where/who I got it from.
How do you keep track of everything you are listening to?
Personally, I just don’t. I’ve stopped trying to be organised. Stuff that sticks just sticks, and I try not to spend time organising it anymore. I’ve also embraced forgetting and re-remembering music. There’s often a pressure to know everything about music all the time when you work in music, and it can take the joy out of it, so I’ve let the control go.
My partner and I have a shared playlist called “House Music” that’s 24 hours long and is a huge dump of music we like. That’s often a jump off point – put that on shuffle and see where it takes us.
Professionally, I keep folders of sets and files that I’m interested in for partnerships, and I keep it to a minimum by doing my discovery in a different format (playlists across platforms), and then bringing it into “hardcopy” files (mp3, AIFF or Ableton sets) when we’re talking curation.
Do you tip other people off to new music? How?
I’ll often send people I know text messages when I am listening to something and I think of them. I often share music on my Instagram too, and reshare stories and posts of new releases that I’m excited about.
One thing I am absolutely terrible at is off the cuff recommendations. Quite often I’m asked “so what’s something I should be listening to right now?” and I just blank. My brain just doesn’t work like that, and often, I’d like to know what that person normally listens to or is interested in before I’m recommending something.
Anything you want to “promote”?
Ableton makes two free browser based learning websites for those interested in making music: Learning Music and Learning Synths. Really fun and informative playgrounds if you’re interested in music production but not sure where to start.
