Between faith and pop culture: what happens at a paranormal show?
17.12.2025
Translation: machine translated
I'm a guest of paranormal podcasters. And talk to them about safe spaces and scary stories from Switzerland.
The «Kent Club» is located in the centre of Hamburg-Altona, a rather alternative part of the city. Concerts, poetry slams and parties regularly take place here. The musical «Tarzan» is playing in the building next door. I'm here today to watch my favourite mystery podcast «Aktenzeichen Paranormal» live. It's been running for three years on Spotify and co. Now the hosts Conny and Patrick are on tour. The motto of their programme: «Believe what you want, but feel well entertained.»
The venue is sold out almost to the last seat with almost 200 guests. If you want a selfie with Constantin Groß or Patrick Jost, there's a long queue. I watch two visibly excited friends in front of me. One is proudly showing off her bat tattoo on her arm, the other is worried about her hair - as if for the photo, of course.
Source: Anika Schulz
I get myself a beer and sit down. The show begins.
The stage belongs to the audience
Conny kicks off with an urban legend about Hamburg's classy «Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten». It's about eerie footsteps in the corridor and a missing dead woman. The audience is initially creeped out. Then an audience member is brought on stage. Voluntarily, of course. «We now have over 1300 submissions from listeners who tell us about their paranormal experiences. Ghostly apparitions, shadows on the walls, drawers that open themselves. And if someone from the site is there, we link it to our appearance», explains Conny.
Whoever writes to «Aktenzeichen Paranormal» knows that their experiences will be taken seriously. «We are a safe space. We are not interested in judging or scrutinising. We simply offer people a place to go for the things they can't get rid of anywhere else.»
So does the aforementioned audience member, who is now speaking on stage at the «Kent Club». Her experience revolves around the infamous «Cecil Hotel» in Los Angeles. On 19 February 2013, the body of Elisa Lam, a Canadian woman who had been missing for weeks, was recovered from the hotel's water tank. «I had brushed my teeth with the water that day. When the police found the body, I immediately checked out», the viewer recalls. Patrick looks shocked. Conny jokes: «Always drink bottled water when travelling.» The viewer laughs, the punchline is spot on.
I feel like an alien
Officially, the case of Elisa Lam is considered an accident, but other theories are circulating among mystery and true crime fans. Was it murder? Or was it a haunting? As a mystery fangirl, I am of course familiar with the story surrounding the «Cecil Hotel». But this is my first time at a paranormal-themed live event. I take a curious look around the «Kent Club» to see who else is there. I see a few students, lots of couples in their mid-thirties, some older people and someone with seven piercings on their face. I feel a bit like an alien. Listening to the «Aktenzeichen Paranormal» podcast at home while cleaning is one thing. Being around people who are so confident about supernatural topics is something else.
Source: Anika Schulz
Before I can think any further, the «hot microphone» goes round. The invitation to the audience to tell their own scary experiences. A man in a hoodie and jeans begins and tells in a calm voice how he saw the ghost of his deceased father on the motorway. Then a middle-aged woman tells how she met a glowing figure in the kitchen of her parents' house at night when she was a child. A third person tells how his two-year-old son saw his uncle in the mirror, even though he wasn't even in the room. «I threw the mirror away afterwards.» (I should have too. HELP.)
After an hour and a half, the live event is over and I'm pretty shaken up inside. And I have questions. Lots of questions.
All those scary stories, intense. Is your show scripted in places?
Conny: No, it's all real. We hardly prepare anything for our shows and improvise most of it. Anyone who wants to say something is allowed to do so. And we always tell our guests: we're just normal people, you can share anything with us. Nevertheless, there are always a few people who are so excited that they can't get a word out.
But that's crazy. Then I stand there in front of 200 people and tell them that I've seen my dead father.
Patrick: Yes, it takes courage. But we don't force anyone to say their name. We once had a guest on a show who wanted to tell his story completely anonymously. And that was okay. Sure, you're standing there in front of 200 people, but you also know that nothing gets out and we're here among ourselves.
Conny: I don't know if I could do that myself. So standing up in front of 200 people and describing my paranormal experience.
Were there ever any negative reactions from the audience?
Conny: No, not at all. And we do everything we can to protect people. For example, we have already received requests from Youtubers asking if they can make reaction videos on our podcasts. We have always refused. We don't want our listeners to possibly be ridiculed.
Patrick: My horror scenario is that someone in the audience shouts: «What kind of rubbish is this?». Fortunately, that never happened.
Conny: And in the end, we can't check whether what the guests are telling us is true. That's entertainment. People come to us because they want to be scared. And because they're happy that someone is finally talking about these topics.
Source: Patrick Jost
Looking around the «Kent Club», Conny and Patrick really seem to hit a nerve. The atmosphere in the hall is quiet, almost reverent. Everyone listens spellbound. And it's not just the tour that's going well, the podcast is too. Every month, «Aktenzeichen Paranormal» reaches over 260,000 people from Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Liechtenstein. And the trend is rising.
Mystery is no longer a niche topic
Perhaps this is because mystery in general is slowly emerging from its quirky niche and «is becoming socially acceptable». For example, the Freiburg Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Psychohygiene - IGPP for short - is engaged in «systematic and interdisciplinary research into previously insufficiently understood phenomena and anomalies at the limits of our knowledge» and offers counselling for those affected. Anyone who believes they have encountered a ghost can contact the IGPP and receive psychological support. You can tell that this is not complete nonsense simply by the fact that the institute's collection of around 60,000 books belongs to the Freiburg University Library.
Recently, I even found a factual article in the current issue of the magazine «Psychologie heute» about the explanations psychology has for the paranormal. For example, it deals with the «confirmation bias». In other words, the phenomenon that people tend to interpret information in such a way that it fits their basic assumptions. In other words, if you already firmly believe in ghosts, you are more likely to see them.
Does it all sound like hocus-pocus to you? Feel free. I particularly like the books that combine spirituality and science.
Back to Conny and Patrick from «Paranormal». And what role they play in Switzerland.
Switzerland also has spooky things to offer
You now have another format, «Aktenzeichen Kids», in which you prepare scary stories for children. Are you also successful with this?Conny: We don't market the kids format. But, and this is really nice, a teacher from Switzerland uses the podcast to promote listening comprehension among her pupils. She plays them an episode in class and the children have to answer questions about it afterwards, such as «What is a Bigfoot?». The children have even written us fan letters. That makes my heart beat faster.
How many fans do you have in Switzerland?
Patrick: About 20 per cent of our listeners come from Switzerland or Austria. And we also receive some submissions with paranormal experiences from Switzerland, which we then play in the podcast.
Are there any recurring topics that come from Switzerland?Conny: We have a lot of submissions about scary dreams. Or about the man in the hat who stands in the room at night. However, the stories don't really differ from country to country.
Do you actually know the legend of the Belchen Tunnel?
Patrick: No, tell me about it!
It's about two friends who picked up a hitchhiker dressed all in white in their car outside the Belchen Tunnel in the 1980s. They then drove into the tunnel with her in the back seat. And at the end of the tunnel, the woman had disappeared.
Conny: The white woman, the classic...
Classic?
Conny: Yes, she likes to haunt motorways. There are many places where she has allegedly been seen. All over the world. Some say it brings bad luck. Others claim it warns of misfortune.
Patrick: We can still include the legend of the Belchen Tunnel in our podcast so that we become a bit more international. We still have 130 unfinished topics on our list anyway.
Are you never afraid that the mystery hype will collapse?
Conny: It's always rattling around in my head. I gave up my job in the public sector for the podcast because it wasn't possible to do both at the same time. On the other hand, our tour was almost sold out. So, take a deep breath.
Take a deep breath. I need to do that first. I stumble out of the «Kent Club» into the cold night and breathe in the clear air. Hopefully I won't come across any dark shadows on my way home. Gulp.
Header image: Shutterstock
Anika Schulz
Teamleader Editorial
Anika.Schulz@galaxus.deAs a child, I was socialised with Mario Kart on SNES before ending up in journalism after graduating from high school. As a team leader at Galaxus, I'm responsible for news. I'm also a trekkie and an engineer.
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