Stella Gunther often sits on SPA couches with her headphones on and software synths open, creating pop music in whatever free time she can find. When not producing music, Gunther is often thinking of it. She creates melodies in her head, listens to her favorite artists for inspiration and tracks the expansive world of pop production.
“I just feel like music occupies my brain a lot,” she said.
Gunther got into music production in late 2019, and sort of by accident.
“I was just messing around on Garage Band trying to make a Lorde-type instrumental. They were not good but I was just starting,” she said.
Lorde is a pop artist from New Zealand hailed for her clean and intriguing production style. A Lorde sticker decorates the back of Gunther’s computer, joined by album covers and tour paraphernalia from other electronic music icons FKA Twigs, Shygirl, and Charli XCX.
“A throughline between [artists] would be cool electronic music that’s catchy and fun to dance to and makes you feel a certain way,” Gunther said of her inspirations.
Gunther’s love for other pop artists drives her own music creation. Out of all her influences, Gunther considers British dance and electronic artist Charli XCX to be queen.
“The way she makes pop music is so cool. She is not afraid to try to be a little experimental with what producers she gets on her stuff,” Gunther said of Charli XCX.
Gunther’s inspirations are producers who are not afraid to push the boundaries of the genre and create daring projects. Producer SOPHIE, considered by many to be the mother of hyperpop, is another one of her inspirations.
“She has made very cutting edge electronic stuff, but has also over the past decade, really shaped pop music,” Gunther said. “I try to channel SOPHIE’s production style in my music a lot.”
Gunther finds that by manipulating synths and sound, she is able to create music that is an extension of her emotional state. She is also able to manipulate her own feelings through production.
“I feel really content and happy whenever I am making music. It does help me work through certain emotions. If I have a hard day, making music is cathartic,” she said.
Gunther describes her artistic process as more intuitive rather than structured or formal. She lets the music take the lead.
“I don’t go into it thinking about what emotion I want to create or what I want it to sound like, I just go with the flow and see where the song takes me. And I guess that is informed by that day,” she said.
However, she does hope to work more with lyrics on her tracks. She sees good lyricism as an essential component of her dream production career but struggles to convey the same emotion through words as she does through sound.
“There’s a lot of music I love that has thought-provoking lyrics, but to me that’s not as important as the feeling that you get while listening to it. I think pop music is one of the most powerful things to do that because it’s so catchy and makes you want to dance.”
Gunther feels like this transfers to her own work: “Oftentimes I am better able to communicate an emotion through the sound of the song and that sort of visceral feeling and danceability rather than super deep lyrics,” she said.
Gunther spends most of her free time making music—it is what she loves. She looks toward a career in music in the future and is constantly working on honing her creative process. She hopes to add more structure to her production.
“Sometimes it feels like I can just keep working on something forever and ever and it’s never going to be done. A goal of mine is to become better at laying out a timeline and how I want to finish and how I want a song to be,” she said.
Gunther returns to her software synths nearly every day to construct mood-boosting melodies.
