Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hey, it's Flora, and you are listening to Science Friday. Have you noticed that your appliances have suddenly begun to serenade you? Listen to this washing machine. And it's not this one diva. Many new dishwashers, dryers, vacuums have sonic signatures. So why are so many brands turning to sound to try to make their products sing?
Chapter 2: What makes modern appliances create musical sounds?
And who are the composers making music for your Roomba or your washing machine? Well, my next guests. Audrey Arbini has composed for Whirlpool, KitchenAid, and the London Olympic Games, and also Microsoft Xbox 360. She's the owner and executive producer of AudioBrain. And Joel Beckerman is a composer and founder of Made Music Studio. He's composed for NFL, IMAX, Roomba, AT&T.
And he also wrote a book called The Sonic Boom, How Sound Transforms the Way We Think, Feel, and Buy. Audrey, Joel, thank you for being here. Thank you for having us.
Appreciate it.
Okay, why are my appliances suddenly making music? How did we get here?
In my opinion, we got here for several reasons. One, because technology is now capable of putting... Interesting kinds of sounds into devices that aren't just pings and blips. Number two, the marketplace is so saturated and crowded that people want to differentiate. And three is the overall customer experience.
Yeah, I think the real... I almost want to jump to the problem. The problem is there is so much of this now. A while back, it actually was really valuable to people. Brands could really send out. Customer experience really benefited. But in a lot of ways, everything's making too many sounds, and it's too loud and too long.
They're not thinking about sound in the totality of somebody's day, but they're thinking about just the sound of their product.
They're adding literal bells and whistles just to be a bell and whistle.
Yeah.
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Chapter 3: Who are the experts behind appliance sound design?
It's too long. It's too monotone. Even though it sounds like a little fife, but it sounds like an old, cheap sound when we could do so much better. And most importantly, it's too long.
I love that you all are hating on this. I feel vindicated. But are there differences, Audrey, between a cheap sound and a luxury sound?
I believe there is. I mean, there's ways to do sounds that sound like quality and sounds that sound like the old piezo buzzer sounds. And that's kind of what this reminded me of. Just don't sit well, at least, you know, for... People with discerning ears and the general consumer, just because we can play sound doesn't mean we have to play sound everywhere and all the time.
It starts to sound like a cacophony. Joel?
Yeah, it's, you know, I think just to add is we want to use sound in intentional ways. We have to think about sounds that are functional and emotional. Emotional, it should feel like what you might want to do in association with a particular brand, if it's a luxury car or if it even is a toaster or whatever it is. Those should have a different feeling to it.
And then functional, to what Audrey was saying, that... These sounds need to make sense so that it's not just pulling you out of the experience. It's like becomes part of the experience. It's like you think about, you know, in the analog world, when you hear a car rev, you know what that is. You know what's happening.
You started the car, you've added gas, and you're kind of hearing that, you know, that guttural sound of it's warming up. So you know what that is in the real world. And the question is, okay, well, when you have a sound, like for instance, electric cars don't naturally make a sound. So what should the electric car sound like? Now, you need it to be functional.
You need to make sure people understand that it is a car. So if it's driving by you, you hear it and you'll take a step out of the way. If it sounded like a spaceship, you wouldn't know what it was and you might get hit by the car.
Right. Or if it's too organic, you might be like, oh, what's that stampede of deer coming down the road?
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Chapter 4: Why are brands using sound to enhance customer experience?
And here's the power off. What was your approach? How did you decide what it should sound like?
We have a team of composers and strategists, and before we write any sound, we do a lot of research and we do a lot of experimentation. And in this case, which is Whirlpool, we we wanted to communicate what the brand was saying, which was that Whirlpool is, and we were doing Whirlpool and KitchenAid at the same time.
And, you know, they're both under the Whirlpool brand and Whirlpool is all about caregiving and, you know, the pleasure of doing chores and everyday tasks and warmth and reassurance and, you know, the joy of chores. And to communicate that.
It was like about a human touch. The joy of chores. That sounds like a tough assignment, the joy of chores.
Well, listen, you go online, how many videos are there now watching people clean their house? Come on, seriously.
True.
But it really – and you know what? The funny thing is, at least for me, I love doing laundry. I know a lot of people don't, but the concept of putting things in when they're a mess and taking them out warm and fluffy is – I have no problem doing laundry.
And to have that sound, you know, to use the harp in there and like in some of the other sounds we did for Whirlpool, we had like hands rubbing on jeans and – you know, these textural sounds that are warm and rich. And, you know, these sounds really did resonate with the consumers on a pretty large scale.
Let's hear the notification again. I can hear what you mean about the sort of warmth. Also much shorter than the ditty we just heard.
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