Jared Gutstadt
Jared Gutstadt is the CEO and Founder of Audio Up, a company dedicated to building an ecosystem of premium entertainment content within the music and audio spaces. From fictional scripted podcasts—which include musicals where the records themselves become foundations for stories—to a series of unfiltered interview programs, Audio Up is committed to creating new and innovative forms of IPs. Gutstadt’s unique and vertically integrated approach to content creation also attracts major brands seeking a premium audio entertainment solution, such as white-label podcasts, original soundtracks, and series theme music that align seamlessly with each brand’s culture and approach.
Gutstadt and Audio Up’s first podcast, Bear and a Banjo, was considered a major innovation within the podcast realm. It was named by Variety as one of the best music podcasts of 2019 and was highlighted by Fast Co. for the program’s unique approach to incorporating advertising into its storytelling. That same year, Adweek named Jared “Podcast Innovator of the Year.” In 2021, Audio Up partnered with the NBA’s Golden State Warriors and Chase Bank to create a year-long podcast, Beyond 28, hosted by ESPN’s Marc Spears that helped continue the country’s conversation about Black History beyond the month of February.’
The podcast featured members of the Warriors community celebrating Black Culture and honoring Black History that’s made every day. This innovative and important podcast won a CLIO Sports Award in 2021. For Beyond 28, Jared also created a custom theme song with Billboard #1 artist 24kGoldn entitled “Warriors Freestyle,” which garnered league-wide adoption and considerable media attention. Audio Up has also produced, recorded, edited, and sound-designed a narrative docuseries about women’s soccer for Nike’s in-house branded content studio, Waffle Iron, creating a custom theme song with artist A1 LaFlare (Doja Cat, Saweetie).
Gutstadt and Audio Up are also at the forefront of revamping pre-existing IP, working with Playboy in their quest to make its vast content archives relevant to a new generation. The Playboy Interview Series was thus created with some of Hollywood’s most notable actors reenacting the legendary interviews from the magazine including Maya Hawke, Gael Garcia Bernal, Natasha Lyonne, Michael Shannon, Taye Diggs, and Shea Whigham, to name only several. Audio Up has also adapted Stephen King’s Strawberry Spring short story into a scripted podcast which coveted the #1 spot on Apple Fiction Podcast charts in 37+ countries and was downloaded approximately 3 million times. Additionally, Audio Up created a scripted series entitled Midnight at the Sun Diner, which tells the story of the iconic Sun Records, and stars G-Eazy as Elvis Presley.
Audio Up has earned great success on the podcast charts: Its Mea Culpa podcast, co-produced with Meidas Touch Media and hosted by Michael Cohen, has garnered more than 22.5 million downloads to date, and consistently places in the Top 25 Apple Podcast charts and reaches #2 in Politics. Similarly, the hit country musical podcast, Make It Up As We Go, executive produced by Miranda Lambert, was also a huge success, garnering millions of downloads and impressions during its initial 2020 run. The podcast launched the first country music single ever featured in an original podcast and earned multiple Ambie and Webby Award nominations.
The company also reached early streaming success, accumulating 100 million + streams with Machine Gun Kelly’s song, “Love Race” (co-written and produced by Gutstadt). The creation of the song was the outgrowth of Machine Gun Kelly’s music and acting contributions in Audio Up’s Halloween in Hell podcast. Continuing his string of innovative creative endeavors, Gutstadt created the first ever live podcast/concert hybrid—Prom In Hell Live— presented by NoCap and featuring music performances by jxdn and Nessa Barrett at The Roxy Theatre in Los Angeles in 2021. RedBull sponsored the live stream of the podcast that debuted at #1 across Apple Podcasts and Spotify, where it was the first podcast to land on the latter’s New Music Friday playlist.
The following year, Jared entered the health and wellness space, working with music producer and performer Maejor (Justin Bieber, Drake, Ciara, T-Pain) to create Maejor Frequency—a podcast that takes listeners on a journey through specific frequencies that are intended to connect them to a higher sense of well-being. The podcast became the #1 Audible podcast across all genres, winning Adweek’s Podcast of the Year, Best New Podcast, Best Travel Podcast, and Best Creativity Podcast of 2022.
Audio Up has secured substantial capital from an impressive array of investors, including the #1 streamed artist in the world, The Weeknd, and his management company SALXO, the CEO of Warner Records Aaron Bay-Shuck, MGM, Primary Wave, and Reservoir Music. The company has forged a strategic partnership with Sirius XM, providing incredible content reach across satellite radio, Pandora, Stitcher, and all SXM channels.
With dozens of projects in the pipeline, Jared is now creating a next-generation concept for the literary world, creating new masters and music publishing rights that remain connected to the book IP from print to podcast to film, TV, and touring.
Additionally, Jared and Audio Up are launching a record company, Audio Chateau Records, that will break artists in untraditional ways to create an alternative roadmap to artist success rarely represented in the current music industry landscape, Audio Up will utilize its unique channels to
sign developing artists discovered in the digital space and beyond. Artists will be provided access to Audio Up’s creative headquarters in Los Angeles and Nashville, The Audio Chateau, which functions as studio/house hybrids where writing camps and showcases give the company’s artists the opportunity to immerse themselves in the creation of music without the usual time and cost pressures. Along with specifically signed artists, Audio Up will also distribute music from their podcasts and third-party ventures.
Prior to founding Audio Up, Jared was the President, CCO, and co-founder of Jingle Punks, a hugely successful Audio Creative Agency with offices in Los Angeles, New York, and Toronto. As the lead creative at Jingle Punks, Gutstadt, operating under the moniker “Jingle Jared,” composed and produced numerous themes and scores for television, with clients that included Warner Pictures, Lego, Ninjago, YouTube, History Channel, NBC’s The Voice, and ESPN’s Sportscenter, as well as films such as Ratchet & Clank, Eagle Huntress and the Emmy nominated 89 Blocks produced by LeBron James. Upon its 2008 launch, Jingle Punks revolutionized the commercial music industry, launching innovative partnerships, developing patented proprietary technology, and creating memorable music marketing moments that had a major impact on the entertainment industry. Jingle Punks has been featured in numerous high-profile media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Billboard, Rolling Stone, Wired, Variety, and Bloomberg Businessweek.
As a music producer and songwriter, Jared has collaborated with a diverse array of notable musical figures, including Jason “Poo Bear” Boyd, Miranda Lambert, Brad Paisley, Bob Dylan, Lil Wayne, Dierks Bentley, Steven Tyler, Machine Gun Kelly, Kris Kristofferson, 24kGoldn, T Bone Burnett, Timbaland, Nicky Jam, and DJ Khaled. He is a two-time Emmy nominee, three-time Cannes Lions winner, and one of ASCAP’s most synched TV composers since its founding. Jared joined NYU Tisch as Chief Collaborator-in-Residence in 2020, helping students to work together across industries and invent real-world, disruptive products.
Gutstadt is the leader of the Hipster Orchestra, a classical chamber group based in New York that covers contemporary pop and hip-hop hits and has drawn accolades from The New York Times and tastemaker site BrooklynVegan. The orchestra commenced a recording and partnership agreement with Lava Records/Universal Music Group to mount this concept as a live touring event with a debut collaboration with rapper Lil Pump on his Gucci Gang “Harvard Remix.” Gutstadt and the Hipster Orchestra performed live at Nas’ Illmatic 20th anniversary concert alongside the Johannesburg Philharmonic Orchestra in South Africa.
Drawing on his experiences as a leader of successful companies and from his early days fronting an indie rock band, Jared has developed The Rock n’ Roll CEO concept, a unique business strategy that he’s articulated in a series of featured columns in the Huffington Post’s Business section and through a TEDx Hollywood talk in Los Angeles.