Jodi Krangle

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Jodi@VoiceoversAndVocals.com

Audio Branding

Interview With John McClain – Part 2

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John McClain knows a thing or two about sound.  For one thing, he’s the owner and lead sound designer/mixer at The Dog and Pony Show in Las Vegas, Nevada (https://www.dogandponystudios.net/).  For another, he won a Grammy for his work with the late, great George Carlin, and an Emmy for his work with HBO on the series 24/7, his work with PBS on the show Outdoor Nevada and his mix of the documentary African Americans: The Las Vegas Experience.   If that’s not enough, he teaches a class in Tech for voice talent through the Voice Actors Studio – https://www.thevoiceactorstudio.com/ – owned by Melissa Moats (https://www.ladyluckvoiceovers.com/ – another fantastic voice talent in Vegas) and another course on Sound for Film at UNLV.

The second part of our discussion covered a bunch more topics like:

  • Voice actors and editors need to pay attention to the tempo of a script
  • How sound that’s inconsistent or simply not good, can make a person turn away without knowing why
  • Information on a book John uses in his course called The Sonic Boom (https://www.amazon.com/Sonic-Boom-Sound-Transforms-Think/dp/0544570162)
  • How sound allows you to time travel
  • When he first became conscious of sound and began to love it
  • How architecture has its own sound
  • Some information on his latest sound design projects
  • More information on his podcast, VO Inertia (https://anchor.fm/voinertia)

Dog and Pony Show can be found on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/DogandPonyStudios/
and on Twitter at @DnPSound

This episode was very skillfully made to sound beautiful by the talented Humberto Franco (http://www.humbertofranco.com/).

Interview With John McClain – Part 1

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John McClain knows a thing or two about sound.  For one thing, he’s the owner and lead sound designer/mixer at The Dog and Pony Show in Las Vegas, Nevada (https://www.dogandponystudios.net/).  For another, he won a Grammy for his work with the late, great George Carlin, and an Emmy for his work with HBO on the series 24/7, his work with PBS on the show Outdoor Nevada and his mix of the documentary African Americans: The Las Vegas Experience.   If that’s not enough, he teaches a class in Tech for voice talent through the Voice Actors Studio –  https://www.thevoiceactorstudio.com/ – owned by Melissa Moats (https://www.ladyluckvoiceovers.com/ – another fantastic voice talent in Vegas) and another course on Sound for Film at UNLV.

The first part of our discussion was a fascinating trip through a bunch of topics, such as:

  • What he teaches students who take his Sound for Film course
  • How music can completely change the tone of a piece of film
  • Why sound needs to be paid attention to
  • How evolution has shaped our understanding of sound
  • How voice talent can use silence to their advantage
  • Why marketers and advertisers are starting to pay attention to good sound design
  • Some examples of sound design – such as casino “win tunes” for machines
  • The laws about manipulation using sound in casino gaming (there actually are some!)
  • What music notes are used more often for the sound in casino games and why
  • How it’s the wild west in advertising when it comes to sound
  • How to use compelling sound in advertising

John’s podcast, VO Inertia can be found at https://anchor.fm/voinertia
Dog and Pony Show can be found on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/DogandPonyStudios/
and on Twitter at @DnPSound

This episode was very skillfully made to sound beautiful by the talented Humberto Franco (http://www.humbertofranco.com/).

18 Minutes to Harness the Power of Sound

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Did you know that human behavior can actually be modified with the use of sound?  It works very effectively.  Take the “piano stairs” experiment, for instance.  The first time I see this mentioned is in 2009 – but there have since been similar installations in China and India and a whole host of other places.  The experiment though – and its results – are  powerful.  Have a look at this video for an idea of how this works:

The sounds make taking the stairs more rewarding for people.  That means a lot more people take the stairs and maybe those stairs are doing their part in helping people to get that little extra bit of exercise into their day.  But if you boil it down to its essence, this kind of technology – and harnessing sound to do it – changes human behavior.

Now obviously, this kind of sound manipulation – placing it in settings where it might influence people to do one task over another – can be used quite well in advertising and marketing.  And it HAS.

In an article from 2015 within the APS (The Association for Psychological Science) called Background Music Influences Buying Behavior – https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/minds-business/background-music-influences-buyer-behavior.html – mention was made specifically of studies involving background music while people were purchasing items in a store or entrees in a restaurant.  This kind of sound stimulation seems to more readily call to mind our associations to products, with certain types of music.  And when we more easily recall the things associated with that music, recognition helps influence what we buy.

Apparently, this also happens with the type of music listened to.  While Classical music is associated with “more expensive” and “more luxurious” social identity items like perfume and jewelry, Country music seems to influence people buying every-day items like toothbrushes and disposable pens to spend more on those items.  Here’s a quote that sums up the point of the article:

“While background music may not convince buyers to abandon their typical preferences, this study suggests that a little attention to detail when selecting music could help retailers make a few more sales.”

It’s amazing how our brains work, isn’t it?

Background music and soundscapes can also be used to great effect in the healthcare industry.  Hospitals, for instance, are typically loud.  Lots of beeping, alarms, noisy machinery and conversations happen in that environment every day – and those stuck inside it – both patients and health care professionals – suffer the consequences.

It’s stressful.  But research is being done into how sound could lessen that stress.  It’s also being proven that soothing sounds provide a quicker healing process.  There’s a great deal of research still to be done in this area, and I’ll probably talk more about it in a future blog (episode), but when you think about it, it makes perfect sense.

Sound is truly the quickest way to our brains. And someone who knows a lot about this, is Steve Keller.  He’s one of the world’s leading experts in the field of audio branding.  And his TEDx talk in Nashville a few years back, is brilliant stuff.  In fact, he was just hired by Pandora US to be their Sonic Strategy Director.  That certainly sounds cutting edge to me!  Way to go, Pandora!

Clearly, audio branding is powerful – and Mr. Keller has an inside track.  Here’s the video of his talk – and I think after watching it, you’ll agree.  Watch this space (and subscribe to the podcast!) because you’ll be hearing more from Mr. Keller in future blogs and podcast episodes!  He has a LOT to say about this stuff – and it’s information we all need to understand better!

Pay attention!  Because there’s no mistaking it.  Harnessing the power of sound, is the wave of the future.

Interview with Podcast Producer, Kattie Laur – Part 2

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Kattie Laur has a background in broadcast radio so it naturally seemed to follow that she would become interested in podcasts.  She’s putting that passion to good use as a podcast producer and gives us some tips on what makes a great show, why she feels podcasts are an important medium and how they’re the wave of the advertising future.

In this second part of our interview, she talks about:

* what a podcast needs to do to keep her listening to their intro over and over
* how she decided to create sound breaks to switch between thoughts within a podcast
* how different cultures experience your audio differently (context is everything!)
* the differences between podcasts she’s paid to produce (“learned passion”) vs. her passion projects
* what she can do for people when she’s producing podcasts
* how many different hats she wears, doing what she does
* some more information about how she’s highlighting female-fronted podcasts in her blog
* how podcasting is still a bit of a male-dominated industry – so she feels more people should hear women’s voices in podcasts
* why podcasts appeal to people so much
* how advertisers are catching on to the potential in podcasts

Her website is at: https://www.kattielaur.com

She has some really helpful information in her blogs, too!
She’s written about the 5 key things you need to think about before starting a podcast: https://www.kattielaur.com/blog/how-to-start-a-podcast-5-key-things

And she’s started a blog series that highlights women podcasters and their shows: https://www.kattielaur.com/blog/podcasts-by-women-to-stop-sleeping-on-vol-1

Her ethical travel podcast is called Alpaca My Bags: https://audioboom.com/channels/4984382

(and is in all the major podcast outlets)

And you can find and follow her on Twitter: @podkatt

This episode was very skillfully made to sound beautiful by the talented Humberto Franco (http://www.humbertofranco.com/).

Interview with Podcast Producer, Kattie Laur – Part 1

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Kattie Laur has a background in broadcast radio so it naturally seemed to follow that she would become interested in podcasts.  She’s putting that passion to good use as a podcast producer and gives us some tips on what makes a great show, why she feels podcasts are an important medium and how they’re the wave of the advertising future.

In this first part of our interview, she talks about:

* her beginnings in studying broadcasting
* her interesting relationship with the CBC
* how she got into podcasting
* how she decided she could produce podcasts for a living
* what kinds of clients she works with
* what fires her up about producing podcasts
* why she feels the concept is way more important than the equipment you use.
* how audio branding plays a role in the production of podcasts

Her website is at: https://www.kattielaur.com

She has some really helpful information in her blogs, too!
She’s written about the 5 key things you need to think about before starting a podcast: https://www.kattielaur.com/blog/how-to-start-a-podcast-5-key-things

And she’s started a blog series that highlights women podcasters and their shows: https://www.kattielaur.com/blog/podcasts-by-women-to-stop-sleeping-on-vol-1

Her ethical travel podcast is called Alpaca My Bags: https://audioboom.com/channels/4984382

(and is in all the major podcast outlets)

And you can find and follow her on Twitter: @podkatt

 

This episode was very skillfully made to sound beautiful by the talented Humberto Franco (http://www.humbertofranco.com/).

This Might Make You Uncomfortable

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ASMR stands for Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response. It has to do with certain triggers, usually having to do with sound or sight, giving you “tingles in your brain”.  It may seem like a strange reaction to have while hearing unintelligible whispers, someone using a marker on a pad of paper or seeing someone use a makeup brush to caress your “face” (when the face is the camera). But it’s very real!

And interestingly, music in this particular context, seems to take away from the experience, rather than add to it.  In Duncan Geere’s article about this phenomenon in Science Focus: https://www.sciencefocus.com/the-human-body/asmr-more-than-a-feeling/ – one of the scientists he questions has this to say:

“We’re interested in things like whether particular settings might be helpful, or particular object interactions,” explains Davis.

“[The results] were actually a bit of a mix. But the one thing that was really clear and surprising is that people didn’t like background music. That to me is really odd, because we use music all of the time to enhance a mood that you’re trying to experience. That doesn’t seem to work for ASMR. It seems to distract from the sound of an object being interacted with.”

Huh.  So the two types of sound, don’t seem to go together. Our brains are strange.

In my own deep dive into this topic however, I actually did experience these “brain tingles”.  I first heard about ASMR when IKEA used it in one of their commercials.  It’s included below.

When I first saw and heard this video, I have to admit, it kind of creeped me out.  I didn’t understand why the woman’s voice was so whispery-soft, and I truly didn’t understand what the attraction was to all those sounds of sheets being stroked, pillows being squished and desk lamps being tapped with fingernails.  I didn’t get it.  And at the time, I didn’t particular want to explore what it was all about.

In my research into sound and the science of sound, ASMR kept coming up – again and again.  And now that I’ve experienced what it actually IS, I’m impressed by what they put together.  (And if you watch the video, read the comments below.  They’re hilarious!)  While I didn’t mind the voice they used, she was a bit louder than I was expecting for this particular genre.  Of course, I get that she had to talk above a whisper so that she could be understood.  She was, after all, there to sell a product. And that meant you had to hear what she was saying.

I’m not sure it works as true ASMR as a result, because you have to concentrate too much for it to really be as relaxing as it should be.  But as an example of how this could be used for a different kind of advertising experience, it’s not half bad.  If you get it.  Seeing as they’re trying to appeal to college students, I don’t think that’s a bad bet.

I’ll also point out that the pops and crackles of lips smacks and tongue movements from a voice being that close to a mic, would be a nightmare for most voice over.  But for ASMR?  The intimacy of it is supposed to be relaxing. That’s the point.

One of the best “performers” of this that I’ve seen while going down the rabbit hole of YouTube, is Gibi.  I’ll link to one of her videos in my blog & show notes so you can have a look and a listen. But I’ll admit, I’ve subscribed to her channel.  In this video (the link is below), she collaborates with a couple of other performers so you get a good overview of a bunch of potential triggers from different performers with slightly different styles:

https://youtu.be/hxXnfGD3vUM

For those of you that have been following my blog here, you know I’m a gamer.  Gibi even did a video where she interacted (the video was about wood tapping and scratching) with a product from Wyrmwood! (They were a sponsor for this video. And she promoted them perfectly for her audience.)

And if you’d like to know more about this from Gibi herself (and, coincidentally, actually hear her real speaking voice – which I admit, I was curious about), have a look at the video I’ve linked to from a YouTube channel called Rooster Teeth. They had her on the show as a guest and asked her a bunch of questions that she very intelligently answered.

It’s a very interesting conversation, on a whole bunch of levels, and I highly recommend you watch it.

Ultimately, you have to decide if this works for you.  If not, it might make you very uncomfortable.  If it does work for you, watching these videos might well be the most relaxed you feel all day.  You’re welcome.