How Jim-E Stack turns the studio into a sandbox: “I’m not trying to push anyone through a certain mould”As 2025 comes to an end and the music world begins taking stock, it’s clear producer Jim-E Stack has had a transformative year.
The 33-year-old produced two of the year’s key records alongside their respective artists, amping up the beautiful catharsis of Lorde’s Virgin and lending his ear for pristine, unpredictable sounds to Bon Iver’s Sable, Fable. On both projects, the artists’ voices and vulnerable lyrics are front and center, underscoring what the producer does best: centering openness, collaboration and experimentation.
Jim-E Stack is on the MusicTech Cover. Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
They also mark Stack out as a prominent producer today. He’s helping bring left-field electronic sensibilities and experimentation into pop music, and it’s sounding better for it. The production and pop worlds have been abuzz about Stack, who has been featured by Universal Audio and the deep-diving Tape Notes podcast – as well as Billboard and GQ. A first-time Grammy nomination for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical could be imminent.
“It’s such an amazing moment, and I’m so grateful for it – to have such a fulfilling year of catharsis with these albums coming out with two artists who I really believe in to their cores,” Stack says in a recent chat from his Los Angeles home. He sits on his couch – his favoured spot for solo jam sessions – flanked by two guitars, and is open and thoughtful in conversation.
“It has certainly set a standard for the kind of work I want to do and what I want to put in… That’s something I want to bring forward from it, really investing my time and creative energy with amazing people that inspire me as individuals.”
“The less tightly you’re grasping onto something, the more room something has to grow”
Born James Horton Stack in San Francisco, music has been core to his life from a young age, drumming in hard rock cover bands in middle school and moving onto jazz bands afterwards. He started to make beats as a teen after having his mind blown listening to the enigmatic British post-dubstep producer Burial. 2007’s Archangel inspired Stack to produce: “If I had never heard Burial and learned this guy was making heartbreaking music just out of samples on Sony Acid Pro, I don’t think I ever would have pursued it myself.”
Soon, he began touring as a DJ, releasing (bootleg) remixes on SoundCloud, and, in 2012, a groovy debut EP on London indie label Good Years. A few years in, though, he desperately missed the collaborative environment bands provided and began to pursue producing and songwriting with artists, bolstered by a move to Los Angeles.
Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
“I really wanted an outlet where I could get my voice across. It taught me that you can make something alone and find your voice that way. Oddly, through doing that and having the room to do it alone, when I got back into making music collaboratively, songwriting and producing with people, I had more of a voice and a language to bring to other people,” he explains.
Now, he thrives in the balance of both working with artists (the list has included Kylie Minogue, Sia, Lola Young, Hayley Williams and Charli XCX) and working on beats and solo music, the latest being his 2020 sophomore album Ephemera. Drums and collaboration have remained essential to his artistry; Lorde says “there’s no better drum programmer than Jim-E.”
Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
The artist’s way
Jim-E Stack has a distinguishable sound: layered, decidedly electronic music with jagged edges and lush (often live) instrumentation. His affinity for somewhat lo-fi tools, including his favourite synths, the Moog Rogue and Korg Polysix, adds a DIY flavour and keeps his productions from sounding overly polished. Most importantly, he preserves space for the artists’ sound and vision to shine through.
“I have a very open approach to making music these days. I’ve found the less tightly you’re grasping onto something, the more room something has to grow and the more room there is for magic to come in,” Stack says.
“A lot of us producers are perfectionists by nature. The more I push back on that, not necessarily in the details, but in the big picture of not trying to bend a song or production to my will and leave things a bit more natural, all the work just always feels weightier.”
“There’s just something very pure and raw to what comes out of an artist on an SM7”
Much of that comes down to having time to experiment and slowly uncover what sounds best, as well as to give each other ample space.
“You just have to try stuff and be willing to get things wrong,” Stack posits, pointing to the SABLE, fABLE track If Only I Could Wait, featuring Danielle Haim, as an example.
“I was really hearing this live drum thing and spent a whole fucking day recording all this shit. And it was just wrong. Justin [Vernon, Bon Iver] and I have this dynamic where I had the space to do my thing with it, and he had the space to say, ‘This isn’t right.’ That exchange is really important.”
Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
Back to basics
Stack’s home studio in his converted garage reflects his desire for music-making to be open, experimental and collaborative. “For me, it’s about having an environment that isn’t too intimidating gear-wise to myself or artists, where it’s like, ‘Whoa, all this shit’, but something where we can make a pretty raw and pure idea without having too many things to jump over. [I want it to] feel good and informal and open, like you can approach any instrument,” he notes.
That said, there’s something specifically special about Stack’s deft drum patterns, which charge his music with a propulsive energy, often with a dose of melancholic chords to keep things interesting.
“I love programming drums so much,” he enthuses. “Anything I do always has a pretty distinct drum groove and language to it. [I can] see how my sound’s evolved from when I was making stuff on the computer mostly by myself, or collecting bits for making stuff with other people, to now, where I’m playing a lot more instruments and tracking a lot more live musicians. My stuff now has a more raw, unpolished feeling that is really reflective of who I am and the kind of creator I am, of not trying to push anyone through a certain mould.”
“I believe in taking an artist closer to themselves and their intuition”
A mutual love of Burial, Drake and percussion-centric production gave Lorde and Stack a shared musical language to converse with. The pair first worked together in 2022 while she was on her Solar Power Tour, during which Stack opened a few shows and also reworked some music for her 2023 festival trek. Afterwards, they reconnected in New York to craft new music.
“Our initial conversations were that Ella [Yelich-O’Connor, aka Lorde] really wanted space in the music for her vocal, not a lot of flourishes, not a lot of layers; to keep things pretty open in that sense. So, songs would start in a pretty raw place,” he recalls.
A happy accident while working on the single Man Of The Year marked a turning point for Virgin’s sound and demonstrates Stack’s flexibility as a producer.
“Man Of The Year was originally this bass loop I laid down. She wrote a bunch of melodies and we arranged them, did some lyrical work. There was a point where I was like, ‘OK, let’s flesh it out. I’m gonna put a smooth sub-bass under it.’ I went to the Minimoog, pressed the bass down and the filter was all the way up. It blew my head off. I went to turn it down, to make it smooth. And she was like, ‘No. That was sick, that felt awesome.’ It was not what I was imagining for the song at all. [After that, every] song had the synth filters all the way open,” Stack explains.
Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
Stack has since taken Lorde’s pared-down production approach to heart, having learned “not to bring in a new sound just for the sake of it, to use your existing tools in the song you’re working on,” he says. “[It helps] you build a creative structure, and it presents you with a really distinct piece of work.”
To enhance the intimate feel of both the Lorde and Bon Iver albums, Stack wove demo vocals they recorded on a Shure SM7 mic into the final songs. “There’s just something very pure and raw to what comes out of an artist on an SM7, where you’re not trying too hard, you don’t feel like it’s a final performance, you’re just getting the idea down,” he explains.
Stack’s ability to capture and preserve those pure, off-the-cuff songwriting moments on both projects is testament to the close friendships and preexisting creative relationships in play. While not every one of his collaborators is a friend, many of them are, including Aminé and Dijon, whose most recent music he also worked on.
“When I really know the person I’m working with, I’m able to help them channel what they’re going through personally into their body of work, more than just being a sound maker,” he notes. “Friendship and personal connection are definitely an important factor in my work [that helps it] go a level deeper.”
Image: David Milan Kelly for MusicTech
Producer partnerships
Los Angeles has been a fruitful home base for Stack, who’s also found “fun camaraderie” working with fellow producers. The first one he ever worked with – back in 2015 in L.A. – was Dan Nigro, who was named Producer Of The Year at the 2025 Grammys off the strength of his work with Chappell Roan.
L.A. is also where he connected with one of his other favourite producers, Ariel Rechtshaid, who’s worked with Haim, Vampire Weekend, Arlo Parks, Carly Rae Jepsen, Adele and many others. Collaborating with Rechtshaid was pivotal in teaching Stack to ditch perfectionism and “not be scared of a mess [because] that’s where you find a lot of magic”.
“You’re both just trying to put your heads together to make this thing feel as good as possible,” Stack says of producer-to-producer collaboration. “You have to compromise in little ways; that’s a fun exercise. It’s about perspective and seeing where something should go, and we have different skills and ways of getting there.”
“Friendship and personal connection are definitely an important factor in my work”
For Stack, no matter whether he’s working with another producer or with an artist, one thing is clear: it’s about collaboration and freedom to explore – playing in a sandbox together, not toiling on an assembly line.
“I am a person by an artist’s side,” he says of his role as a producer. “They’re looking for something, and I’m there, not as a guide, but as someone to take out my machete and hack down some thick brush to get to wherever we need to go. And that might involve us taking some wrong turns together, some circling back. That’s where I do my best work.
“There is real partnership and trust together in whichever way we go. I believe in taking an artist closer to themselves and their intuition, and helping them get there.”
Words: Ana Yglesias
Photography: David Milan Kelly
The post How Jim-E Stack turns the studio into a sandbox: “I’m not trying to push anyone through a certain mould” appeared first on MusicTech.

Full FX Media DiffusiaDiffusia is an immersive drone synthesizer VST plugin. Designed for artists and sound designers seeking deep, evolving textures, Diffusia generates rich tonal layers and atmospheric soundscapes with effortless control. Features include: 6-voice polyphonic engine. Multiple waveform selection for shaping unique timbres. Amp envelope for expressive dynamics. Unison mode for thick, wide sound design. Resonant filter for sculpting and shaping your tone. Warm chorus for added depth and width. Built-in effects like tremolo, chorus and reverb. Read More

Google pulls Gemma from AI Studio after Senator Blackburn accuses model of defamationSenator Martha Blackburn argued Gemma’s fabrications are “not a harmless ‘hallucination,’" but rather “an act of defamation produced and distributed by a Google-owned AI model.”

2025 Component Abuse Challenge: A Piezo Disk Powers A TransmitterA piezo disk transducer is a handy part for reproducing beeps and boops, and can also function as a rudimentary microphone. Being a piezoelectric element, it can also generate usable power. Enough to run a radio transmitter? [b.kainka] is here to find out, with what may be the simplest possible transmitter circuit.
The active element in the circuit, such as it is, comes from a crystal. This functions as an extremely stable and high Q tuned circuit. When excited by a pulse of electricity, the circuit will carry oscillations in a similar manner to a bell ringing until the pulse is exhausted. A small lever fashioned from a piece of wire supplies the voltage by flexing the piezo disk and a contact, a diode discharges the reverse voltage as the disk returns to shape, and a small capacitor provides an AC path to ground. It works, if a small pulse of very low-power RF near the crystal’s frequency can be described as working.
It may not be the most practical transmitter, but it’s certainly something we’ve not seen before. It’s part of our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge, for which you still have time to make an entry yourself if you have one.

Song Athletics & BORO launch Alchemia Described as a “study in sonic transmutation”, Alchemia blends a range of string, wind and vocal sounds with samples of modular synths and “esoteric sound objects”.

Slower Fragment by e-instruments The latest addition to e-instruments' Fragments series introduces a free virtual instrument that delivers the “evocative warmth and warped textures of half-speed tape recordings”.

Elon Musk wants you to know that Sam Altman got a refund for his Tesla RoadsterElon Musk and Sam Altman are still taking swipes at each other on Musk’s social media platform X.

2025 Component Abuse Challenge: A Transistor As A Voltage ReferenceFor our 2025 Component Abuse Challenge there have been a set of entries which merely use a component for a purpose it wasn’t quite intended, and another which push misuse of a part into definite abuse territory, which damages or fundamentally changes it. [Ken Yap]’s use of a transistor base-emitter junction as a voltage reference certainly fits into the latter category.
If you forward bias  a base-emitter junction, it will behave as a diode, which could be used as a roughly 0.7 volt reference. But this project is far more fun than that, because it runs the junctions in reverse biased breakdown mode. Using one of those cheap grab bags of transistor seconds, he finds that devices of the same type maintain the same voltage, which for the NPN devices he has works out at 9.5 volts and the PNP at 6.5. We’re told it damages their operation as transistors, but with a grab bag, that’s not quite the issue.
We’ve got a few days left before the end of the contest, and we’re sure you can think of something worth entering. Why not give it a go!

Spitfire Audio: Château Piano Roundtable Video Shortly after the release of their Château Piano library, Spitfire Audio returned to the Château d'Hérouville to capture a selection of performances and hold a round-table discussion comparing the the legendary Steinway Model B with its new virtual counterpart.

Get NI Massive or Excite Audio Bloom Vocal Edit Lite FREE with any Purchase
For the next week, you can score Native Instruments’ Massive ($99) or Excite Audio’s Bloom Vocal Edit Lite ($29) free with any purchase at Plugin Boutique. The deal expires on November 7, 2025, and the purchase needs to be a paid product to qualify. Plugin Boutique will be changing its giveaways each week in November, [...]
View post: Get NI Massive or Excite Audio Bloom Vocal Edit Lite FREE with any Purchase

DamyFx Mr Tank PreampMr. Tank Preamp is a VST3 plugin designed to infuse your tracks with the warmth and sonic fullness typical of a high-end tube preamplifier. Ideal for the mastering stage, this processor is the ultimate tool for adding power, cohesion, and rich harmonic coloration to your mixes. Controls: Volume: Adjusts the input signal level into the preamplifier circuit. Increasing the volume pushes the "tube" to work harder, generating more saturation. Dirty: This control is the heart of the preamp's "dirty" and aggressive character. It allows you to dial in the amount of tube saturation and distortion, ranging from a subtle warmth to a more decisive and gritty crunch, adding body and presence to the signal. 3-Band EQ (Treble, Middle, Bass): A musical three-band equalizer to shape the tone of the preamplifier. Treble: Boosts or cuts the high frequencies to add "air" and brilliance or to tame any harshness. Middle: Controls the mid-range frequencies, crucial for the presence of vocals and lead instruments. Bass: Manages the low frequencies, ideal for adding "weight" and "depth" to the mix or for controlling excess. Master: An output volume control to compensate for the introduced gain increase and ensure perfect gain staging in the mastering chain. Read More

Top Music Business News Last WeekTop music business news last week included major upgrades on tools for Artists from Bandsintown, SoundCloud and DistroKid, Indivisible calling for a Spotify boycott, a free Ticket Data tool, AI music updates and more.
The post Top Music Business News Last Week appeared first on Hypebot.

Free PSP Spector plug-in from PSPaudioware PSPaudioware are getting into the spirit of Halloween with the launch of PSP Spector, a precise 31-band spectrum analyser plug-in that is being made available as a free download.

How Emmy-Winning Sound Designer Ryan Hobler Uses Krotos Studio in His Creative WorkflowAccording to news on Friday, "Emmy Award-winning sound designer Ryan Hobler has built a career spanning Super Bowl ads and national campaigns for brands such as Febreze, E*TRADE, and Applebee’s. At the same time, he is an accomplished composer and musician, continually expanding his body of work as a singer-songwriter and producer. In both post-production and music, Hobler has found Krotos Studio to be an integral creative tool. From designing and mixing sound for high-profile commercials to producing short-form promotional videos for his latest folk-pop EP, he uses Krotos to merge his dual identities as sound designer and musician, streamlining his workflow while opening new creative possibilities."

"With nearly two decades in post-production, Hobler knows how important it is to move quickly without sacrificing creativity," a statement reads. "Deadlines for commercials and branded content often leave little room for trial and error, making workflow speed essential."

“I find that for a lot of the dynamic and moving elements, Krotos Studio is an invaluable tool, because it’s so easy to manipulate those sounds and make them work with the motion of whatever you’re designing,” he explains. For Hobler, that efficiency translates directly into more time spent on creative decisions rather than technical hurdles.“You want as little hindrance as possible, and with Krotos Studio, you can tap into that quicker. You can get to the idea in your head sooner.”

"That efficiency has been critical in recent national ad campaigns that required quick, dynamic sound design. In one spot, the commercial opened with a person navigating a smartphone app, where Hobler drew on Krotos Studio’s UI library to create a synthetic palette of taps and text noises. Later in the same campaign, he was tasked with bringing the sound of a sandwich deconstructing into its individual parts to life. The sequence played like a non-destructive explosion that needed the right sonic detail to match the visuals."

“Krotos Studio is incredible for making the abstract sonically tangible,” Hobler says. “This explosive moment had no basis in reality, so I wound up using a variety of Krotos Studio presets to complement the bombastic music and visual effects.”

"With each update, Hobler notes, Krotos Studio has continued to evolve. The software now offers not only an expanding library of sounds and features but also an AI-powered search that fuels discovery as well as efficiency."

“I use the search all the time, and I love what it comes up with, because sometimes it gives me these nice surprises,” he says. “It makes me curious — would that work in there? I’ll try that. I love the suggestive nature of the search and how it inspires me to try unexpected options.”

"Beyond his commercial work, Hobler’s creative identity extends into songwriting and music production, and Krotos Studio has become a tool that helps him merge these worlds."

“I’ve been trying to bridge the gap between those two arbitrary columns for quite some time, making music that uses sound effects and sounds that weren’t necessarily strictly musical in a traditional sense.” Over the years, he has sampled everyday objects like a switchblade comb, a clock, and even the click of a car’s turn signal to create rhythmic or melodic textures in his songs.

"That crossover also extends into how he presents his music. On his latest single, 'Paper Airplane Life,' one of several tracks released with recording artist Erik Blicker, Hobler applied his sound design skills to promotional video content, creating short teaser clips for social media. He used Krotos Studio for expressive swooshes and transitions, pairing them with cues from the track to give the visuals a cinematic quality. The result demonstrates how he moves between post-production and music, using Krotos as a bridge."The post How Emmy-Winning Sound Designer Ryan Hobler Uses Krotos Studio in His Creative Workflow first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Sonarworks & SOS AI Survey Sonarworks and Sound On Sound are inviting producers, engineers, sound designers and creators worldwide to take a short 5–8 minute survey on how AI is changing music.