Hainbach’s Swiss – For Stefan Paul Goetsch—known online as Hainbach—his studio runs on tape recorders, field-recording apps, and a Swiss Army Knife he won’t swap for anything else. In a wide-ranging interview, he also talks about making music with laboratory gear and telephone-l
When Hainbach talks about his music setup, he doesn’t sound like someone collecting gear. He sounds like someone keeping promises—to sound, to craft, and to the oddball tools that made it possible.
Stefan Paul Goetsch, better known as Hainbach, is a German experimental composer, artist, and YouTuber. He’s most famous for making music with laboratory equipment and scientific instruments. describing his process as being like the “Dark Souls of synthesis.” He leans into hard-mode production techniques that often rely on telephone line testing equipment and gear salvaged from nuclear testing facilities.
That might be the kind of detail that frightens off casual listeners. But his output has never slowed. In 2025 alone, he released six albums, plus a handful of singles and EPs. His latest album is “Gentle Hum,” a collaboration with Ah!. Kosmos, the Turkish composer Başak Günak. The record is built from unconventional percussion, droning analog synths, processed vocals, and the sound of burbling test equipment.
His studio is intimidating by reputation. but when asked what holds it together. Hainbach points to a surprisingly straightforward piece of hardware: “A Nagra reel-to-reel tape recorder.” He uses it for live shows and for music and sound design in the studio. He calls it “a wonder of technology” and the “absolute high-end of its time. ” and says it’s “still sounding fantastic many decades later.”.
For Hainbach, technology isn’t just about sound quality—it’s about finishing a thought. On a new phone or computer. the first app he installs is “Gauss Field Recorder. ” an app he made with Bram Bos to solve a problem he says he always had. He recorded lots of field audio with his phone, assuming he’d use it later. He didn’t. and ended up with a “huge library of unsorted and unnamed voice memos.” With Gauss. he can turn a recording into music immediately and “save and share the session.”.
Even his daily digital life has a rhythm. “Since it’s morning. only my two Gmail accounts and this questionnaire. ” he says when asked how many tabs are open. Later in the day, he expects it to climb into “20-plus,” especially if he’s doing research. He posts across platforms too—he says it’s “pretty evenly split”—but he adds that he’s “mostly” there for work. not recreation.
His favorite online space is his Patreon. He says he loves the community and the security it brought him, and that he “could not have embarked on” his oddball musical journey without it.
And then there’s the one gadget he refuses to let go of. “Definitely the Swiss Army Knife. ” Hainbach says—both “as a kid and as a dad now. ” because it “has come in so useful.” He even uses it on stage to fix his Swiss Nagras. explaining that they work perfectly together. He admits he forgot he had them on flights. and had to mail them to himself from airports across the world. That’s why he doesn’t carry them anymore, “for fear of losing them.”.
When asked what was most disappointing, he doesn’t describe some obscure piece of tech failing. He points to replacements that never felt right: “Anything that tried to replace the Swiss Army Knife,” including “those stupid credit card-sized tools.”
The interview takes a turn toward memory when Hainbach talks about what he played with his kids during the pandemic: “Breath of the Wild.” He says they were “riveted. ” and that the family “suffered and felt joy throughout the game.” When it ended. his kids “burst into tears. ” and he had to promise they would replay it. They did—getting “the full ending.” After that. his oldest played it and achieved “100 percent shrine completion on master mode.” He describes moments that surprised even him. including her changing weapons between strikes to “damage max.”.
The present is where his biggest irritation lives. He says he wishes an entire category of tools would go away: “AI music and sound generators.” He calls them “slop machines for technocrats that never felt the joy of getting good at something.”
If that’s where the tension sits, his proudest creation sits on the opposite end of the emotional spectrum. He talks about his series of “Destruction Loops. ” an installation music piece that “destroys itself over time.” He used it. he says. “to exorcise online hate comments. regrets of viewers and listeners. and far-right speech.”.
He credits one piece of advice with changing how he performs. “Stand still.” He says his wife was watching one of his early live shows as Hainbach. when he still had all the movements from years playing rock and electronic bands. Those movements, he says, “did not correlate with my music at all,” and had become habit rather than intention. Now, he says he curates every movement—“there is not one unconscious thing I do on stage.”.
His current obsession is “Passive Bandpass Filters.” He’s about to drive to East Germany to get a set that used to belong to Deutsche Reichsbahn. the GDR train service. He says these filters often sound wonderful and that he has “quite the collection now.” He also notes that he just turned one of them into a plug-in with Irish company AudioThing.
When he needs to focus, he says he doesn’t do much—just makes time. He taught himself how to zone in quickly during his “mandatory government service. ” when he still felt the “absolute need to create music” in the short breaks he had. When he’s feeling stuck, he goes for a walk to reset. Back in the studio, he challenges his assumptions about what he’s working on. He says the culprit is often the part he builds a track around—nurturing it with supporting structures—until everything is playing together and the track still “is just not happening. not evoking a feeling. world. or story.”.
In that moment, he says, that supporting part may have served its purpose. It can “retire to the background,” disappear, or reveal that it was only “maybe just the muse, not the thing itself.” He adds, with a grim joke, “If killing darlings was a crime, I would serve multiple life sentences.”
He also keeps small rules for how he lives with technology. When asked when he last went somewhere without his phone. he points to the spa area in a hotel in Karlsbad during the Easter Holiday. The last physical media he bought was “Daniela Mars Heartweaving on vinyl on Bandcamp. ” bought “from the artist herself.” He calls it “astonishingly minimal and beautiful music.”.
For splurges, he doesn’t talk about expensive studio upgrades. He says a decent bed—“with a good mattress and pillow”—matters for long-term health, “especially as a touring musician.”
If a biopic tagline ever fits his world. he thinks it should sound German: he mentions how Germany likes “totally over-the-top taglines” even for American movies. He cites Top Gun – Sie Fürchten Weder Tod Noch Teufel (“They Fear Neither Death nor the Devil”) and offers a possible version for himself: “Hainbach – Cold War Confidential.” He says he uses Soviet army wire recorders and American nuclear and military research equipment to make music. giving him some truth behind the title.
He finishes with a small technical confession: he doesn’t think he ever used a meme. though he has seen memes of himself. And then. with a wink at the busy browser life he described earlier. he adds that it’s “eight tabs by the way. ” and urges readers to “totally buy my new album with Ah!. Kosmos that is playing in one of them.”.
Hainbach Stefan Paul Goetsch Gentle Hum Ah! Kosmos Başak Günak Nagra reel-to-reel Gauss Field Recorder Bram Bos AudioThing Passive Bandpass Filters Swiss Army Knife experimental music analog synths field recording app Patreon AI music generators