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A variety podcast from GumAudio covering innovation, creativity and the podcast industry.
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You're partnering with the listener's imagination, so you're prompting them to have an experience in their head. You're not laying it all out in front of them. You're giving them some tools to create something spectacular.
Dan:Hey, this is Dan and welcome to a special episode of the Gut Lab. Today, we'll be talking with Jonathan Roberts, a well known industry sound designer. Jonathan will be sharing with us about the role of sound design, how sound design fits into production, how to tell good sound design from bad, and also how to think about incorporating sound design into a show you might be working on. Alright. Here's Sean.
Dan:Everybody. This is Dan and, I'm here today with my friend Jonathan Roberts.
Jonathon:Hey, Dan. Thanks for having me. It's cool to do this together.
Dan:Yeah, man. I'm excited to do this, because we're kind of, you know, going, underneath the hood of how podcasts are made and how they're structured. And I'm really excited to talk with you today because we're going to be talking about sound design and music and how those, are really integral to making a podcast, what it is and making the experience what it is. So share a little bit about your journey of getting into sound design, getting into audio production. Yeah.
Jonathon:I was a musician growing up, played piano, but I also I like writing music, but I also liked playing with sound. I had a Pentium 75, I think that's what it was called, computer from Best Buy. And I would had a little mic in my bedroom and would, like, record little stories and skits. I liked Weird Al. I liked putting all this together with Cool Edit, which was like this wild, old software.
Jonathon:You couldn't record I couldn't record multiple tracks at a time, so you just keep adding things on to make it thicker and thicker. And, that got me thinking about how fun it was to just play with sounds and make little stories with sounds. So I was always playing around as a kid, and then I went to college for composition and theater, and I always liked taking big ideas and distilling them down into something interesting in music or sound. For me, that was often, the biblical concepts or, big faith concepts, putting them into theater or music in a way that was compelling and interesting. So I played around with that a lot in my career that led me to taking a show on the road.
Jonathon:Apostle Paul took me to New York City where I was in comedy bands and all kinds of dance theater, but my interest was always audio and sound and music. I wrote music for slot machines for a long time.
Dan:That's really interesting. That was strong. The music that goes, like, while you're pulling the wheel.
Jonathon:Yep. Yeah. And all the bells and whistles that tell you you've won. Like, putting you in a place Yeah. As you play and then cueing to you that something good happened.
Dan:Right.
Jonathon:It was always kind of it was kind of fun because you're, like, you're the soundtrack for people at their big like, when they're really happy. If you lose, you kinda move past that quickly. But look.
Dan:Right. Right.
Jonathon:So, anyway, I did that for a while. And then after that, I got into I got into podcasting. I got into podcasting with, starting at Gimlet Media and making a lot of stuff for kids. I worked on Chompers, which is a really fun toothbrushing podcast show for a long time, Story Pirates. And somewhere in there, I moved into audio fiction, which was really, like, a great culmination of all the stuff that I had done because it's telling these big stories with just audio.
Jonathon:And that was that was Gimlet and, Spotify. I started at Gimlet about 5 years ago around when it was, acquired by Spotify. So
Dan:Yeah. Mhmm. So let's talk a little bit about what you just said of like, you only have your ears and because on the projects that I've worked on, I think sound design, especially to folks who aren't into podcasts, sound design probably is kind of unfamiliar. Like you can hear it obviously, but in terms of how it's made, what goes into the process, you worked on both like, real life, you know, like Gimlet shows. You also worked on fiction shows at story pirates.
Dan:And then most recently you're, working on k 63, which was a total fiction science, sci fi show.
Jonathon:Yes.
Dan:How do you think that how do you feel like, music and sound design, like, how is that brought in into the process of telling the story?
Jonathon:Yeah. So whether it's a narrative like a journalistic piece or or fiction, music and sound design serve some, really, important it it plays some important, roles. The one main thing is it, of course, gives clarity. That's a big thing. As you're telling a story, you need, because it's only with our ears, we really need to help the listener follow along.
Jonathon:And, sound and music can, one thing it does is it highlights a shift in a story. Something just happened. We want people to move along with us. We don't want them to get lost. Mhmm.
Jonathon:We also, there's a thing called sound signposting across a lot of media, but in audio, storytelling, we're just helping them, remember something we said earlier with either a sound or a beat or some music change or something that's gonna help them move along with the story. Mhmm. We also sound music in podcasting can help give a story or an interview or anything motion without necessarily commenting on it. So if we're like, it's a journalistic piece, we might wanna help people move through, but not, you know, put ominous stingers in the middle of somebody's reveal
Dan:Mhmm.
Jonathon:Necessarily. Yeah. They don't wanna step on people's information, but we want them to continue to move through the story and be with us and keep Let's talk
Dan:Let's talk about k 63. So tell us quickly what k 63, is or was, and, tell us what your role was.
Jonathon:K 63 was a a fiction podcast based on a the original production was called Caso 63, and it was a Chilean podcast. It was a real hit, by Spotify in Latin America by Julio Roxas, was the writer. And it was a hit that got adapted to, in Brazil and India. And then, the one that I worked on was the English language adaptation. It's a science fiction story about 2 people.
Jonathon:It's a time traveling science fiction story about 2 people that are separated through time and space and story. I tried to give away spoilers, but, it's really about this relationship with these two people. The English version was adapted, by Mimi O'Donnell or was created Mimi O'Donnell is the executive director of this project and ran the fiction studio at at Gimlet and Spotify, which is responsible for a bunch of different shows in that in that space. That's the studio that I worked on, worked in. And the English language version, Julianne Moore and Oscar Isaac in it.
Dan:I love Oscar Isaac so much.
Jonathon:Yeah. They both did such a good job.
Dan:Yeah. He was, he was, Leto, in dune, the he's the father of Timothy Chalamet in dune. And, I love watching him, in anything and now listening to him. Yes.
Jonathon:You know, he's, I think he's just great. Great voice. Yes.
Dan:And your sorry. And your role in case
Jonathon:Well, I was the sound supervisor and sound designer. I wasn't the only one that worked on it in the sound. Daniel Brunell, Daniel Ramirez, and Armando Serrano. I just wanna shout out them because they also worked with me closely on defining the sound of the show.
Dan:How did sound design what was the original vision for you when you're like, hey, I'm gonna I'm gonna be the sound designer or one of the sound designers on this project. What was the original vision for this for the show with sound design?
Jonathon:Well, one of the main things is to support the story and the location that they're locations that they're moving between and really, like, all fiction, sound designs or storytelling. We really wanna bring the audience into these places, so we feel like we're right there with the characters. Related to that, we really wanna feel like we're tight with these characters, and, audio is so intimate, it allows us to do this. We wanna be, like, right there imagining where we're experiencing their relationship. So intimacy was a key element of this show, creating that sense of in intimacy and also giving a continued sense that something could happen to rupture this connection at any point in the show.
Dan:Oh, yeah. Interesting.
Jonathon:Whether that's a little bit of a sense of dread or
Dan:No. I was I was just gonna say on that, like, the, the nature of the show, it's a dystopian scifi story. And so the nature of the show leaves somebody on edge and what you were saying a minute ago about how one of the roles of sound design is to create motion in the story. And I think part of that motion is leading somebody up to the edge, but not necessarily pushing them over, but they're, they're always kind of in this leaned in anticipating state of what's about to happen. Tell me about how, how that worked for you guys in terms of like, what were the specific, techniques or tools that you would use when you would approach sound design for the show?
Jonathon:Well, one obvious one is this show's really good at cliffhangers, both in the writing and the, the score. The composer's Moat is his name. And, the cliffhangers at the end of this episode are great examples and they go fast and they want and they keep you binging. So I love that about the show. It's really fun.
Jonathon:The other thing that keeps keeps people on edge, and a good example of that is the start of season 2 is a great one to listen to for this. If you haven't listened to season 1, you should probably start there because otherwise you'll be lost. But season 2 picks up with the 2 characters, Beatrix and Peter talking. Beatrix is in an airport bathroom, and Peter is on a phone. And we're put in we're right there with, Beatrix in this bathroom, so we feel like we're there.
Jonathon:And he is distant and and sort of a little bit, distorted in the call, and we lose him we lose him sometimes. And that gives a feeling that this moment is they're speaking in such an, intense way, but also the fact that we're losing him and he feels so distant from us. We have that that POV. We feel like this relationship could be ruptured at any moment. And we and if that happens, she loses, you know, we lose everything with them.
Dan:Hey. This is Dan back in the lab clicking in real quick. Just wanna let you know that the sound design piece that Jonathan is talking about here is embedded in the show notes and in the original post. So you can go check it out if you're curious. All right.
Dan:Thanks. Back to the show. We've talked about this before, but you think that, I think you've said something to me before that you think the audio is the most imaginative medium.
Jonathon:Yes. Because you're partnering with the listener's imagination. So you're prompting you're prompting them to have an experience in their head. You're not laying it all out in front of them. You're giving them some tools to create something spectacular.
Jonathon:And if it's fiction, that can be a, you know, a grandiose world, but even if it's not, even if it's just, you know, an interview or a narrative, journalistic piece, you're sparking something in their imagination, putting them there with the storytellers. And I think that's really unique. Plus, the listeners take these shows wherever anywhere. They can experience your story on a long road trip, on a hike, doing dishes, any moment in their day that is juxtaposed with some other bizarre moment in their day or something they're looking out, you know, on a, you know, a vista while they hear your story. It doesn't necessarily happen, if you're sitting on your couch watching a show.
Dan:Mhmm.
Jonathon:So it's very imaginative experience, I think, listening.
Dan:I've always thought that sound designers have the most imagination out of anybody on the team.
Jonathon:Absolutely. Thank you, Dan.
Dan:My analogy for sound design is, if you think about how, like a fine restaurant works, there's, you know, a team of people in the kitchen. I have thought of sound design as I think it's called the sous chef, the chef who makes the sauce. It's actually the saucier.
Jonathon:Oh, okay.
Dan:Yeah. So like the sauce on a dish either makes it or breaks it. Mhmm.
Jonathon:But
Dan:when there's just that right amount of sauce, the way that it tastes in the mouth is it compliments the actual meat or the protein or whatever. Somebody who's making a sauce has to make the sauce, like in conjunction with, you know, the rest of the team, but it's a separate it's a separate process. Like, you have your own little workstation, you have your own ingredients that you're putting in, and it can be very complex. Yeah. That's why
Jonathon:I'm I think it really it that really that's a great analogy. It does really feel like that. Yeah. And you're realizing the the vision of, you know, the executive chef or you're complimenting,
Dan:I
Jonathon:was just saying. You're helping draw out things from the executive chef.
Dan:Yeah. Tell me about getting back to k 63. What, what were like 1 or 2 moments that really stood out for you that was really memorable or you felt like sound design or the music that you, installed in it, really powered an experience for the listener.
Jonathon:Well, this moment, I think, is really great, in this opening because it's gets us back into the story in a way that I love. But there's also other scenes. There's a really fun immersive scene in season 2 where they're traipsing about, one of the characters apartments, and you really get a sense of sort of what the room how it's fallen apart, all the papers and computers that are around you. And we're walking through the house as they're having this argument, which I think is really fun. Especially knowing that, you know, we recorded these things.
Jonathon:These actors maybe weren't always together in the same moment, and we were all in studios. So to be able create a world around this story was really fun and special.
Dan:Where do you source your sounds from?
Jonathon:We'll often make a lot of our own sounds. It's so fun with audio because you have freedom to just, create the scene as you see it and he and feel it. And as you talk to the director, you could be like, let's try this thing running through an empty hall room in an abandoned school, and you can go run into a school and re you know, record these footsteps.
Dan:Yeah.
Jonathon:Or I'm gonna put it here. I'm gonna put it there. So we'll make our own, and then there's, of course, lots of great sound effects libraries that exist.
Dan:Yeah. And that's a process called foley
Jonathon:Yes. That you that you do. Yeah. Yep. Foley.
Jonathon:Moving clothing and footsteps and any kind of wrestle that you hear with your stuff. I don't know if you can hear this on here.
Dan:Yeah. So for people who, are less familiar with sound design how would somebody measure kind of the effectiveness or the success of a particular, scene or particular episode that is sound designed?
Jonathon:I think the number one is if you can follow the story, if it's clear. Especially if people that haven't heard the story can follow what's happening. A lot of times you'll set a scene in the way you're hearing it, whether it's an elaborate sound design or just, something simple. And someone will hear it a totally different way than you ever imagined, because they're creating a different image in their mind. So it's successful if, in general, most people are seeing and hearing it in a way that keeps them tight to the story or the whoever's whoever's speaking.
Dan:Is some of your role, are you trying to trigger any emotion in a listener? Or is it just a is it just a learning kind of recall type of experience you want somebody to have?
Jonathon:Well, it depends. I think the story I think the story and the the writing or the, interview where we're speaking is that's where the, maybe that's a little more where triggering of the emotion happens, and we're lining up with that and supporting that message. So we're trying not to add our own layer on top of what's there, but just support it. Does that make sense? Yeah.
Jonathon:It's a little different, I think.
Dan:Yeah. What would you say to somebody, a company, a brand, a person who, is maybe is thinking about heavily investing in sound design for a new show that they're working on.
Jonathon:I would remind people that listeners take audio with them and you'd have little control over what how they hear it. So it's if it's not clear, they're gonna be lost and you may not catch them again with audio. It's unlikely that they will jump back 15 seconds many, many times to miss to catch something they missed. They might do it a little bit, but if they're driving or whatever, you might lose them if it's not clear. So you really need to help support the story.
Jonathon:I also wanna remind people that a little investment goes a long way, in audio. Just a little bit of attention to the sound can really step things up in a big way. And, it's also the same because, again, because we're working with people's imaginations, it's the same cost to put a scene in a spaceship as it is on a bus, because they're just they're just sounds.
Dan:Yeah.
Jonathon:And and if you have, you know, if you have a story if you someone's telling a story about a a just a proposal they had or something at a, you know, a beautiful waterfall and you wanna take the listener there, it's it's really simple
Dan:to Yeah.
Jonathon:To trigger something in their mind, easier than, than visuals. Yeah.
Dan:What do you think is, like, the easiest type of sound design to install into a into a given show?
Jonathon:You mean as far as a studio setup or or do you mean?
Dan:You know, k like k 63 is like this whole immersive world
Jonathon:Mhmm.
Dan:Where you have, like
Jonathon:Oh, oh, I know what you're asking.
Dan:You know, you have, like, you have stuff positioned all over on Yeah. On the spectrum. You have high pitches, low pitches. You have things in one channel and another channel bouncing back and forth. And it's really heavy duty work by you and the rest of the team.
Dan:And so that's kind of like on one end of the spectrum. Another end of the spectrum would just be a simple, you know, music, interlude. And then there's all sorts of things in between.
Jonathon:Yes. I think I think yes. The the greatest places to start are those music interludes, helping people take a beat, gather the information that was just presented, mark that there's a change that happened, mark that we've concluded a topic, mark that we're going back to a topic that we touched on earlier. Those little cues, are very helpful, and music is great for that. The next thing that can be fun is, and simple is ambiance if you're telling a story.
Jonathon:I remember when, you know, we were camping and the night was so beautiful. Ambiance can help you. Yeah. Or a little bit of music, can be very simple to to break it up for the listener and support a story that somebody's telling without stepping up.
Dan:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you're essentially just kind of, you know, walking into somebody's imagination.
Jonathon:Yeah.
Dan:Kind of giving them, giving them some colors. And one of my friends has a way of saying it as like, when you're, when you're thinking about a story, you have to think like, is this something that I picture in my imagination? Like, is this something that like genuinely is, is kind of an, it can be quickly developed in my imagination. I can hear the voices and I can hear how they'll they'll sound. And, a good sound designer, can do a lot with, with an imaginary prompt with something that gives a lot of pallet ability, a lot of Sonic pallet ability to kind of,
Jonathon:yeah,
Dan:make this imaginary world or, or, or recreate some sort of memory.
Jonathon:And so many engineers out there have these skills and are excited to try it and maybe working on you made the person in mind that's editing or working on your podcast, and they've been they've been, you know, just with the dialogue so much. And you can people are eager. I guess people are eager to play around and, a a little a little bit of polish on a show can elevate it a lot and make it stand out among the gazillion podcasts that are out there.
Dan:Yeah. I that's what I tell people as well is if you want to invest in podcasting, you, you can invest in all, you know, a range of things. You can invest in great equipment. You can invest in getting, good talent on a mic, etcetera, etcetera. But, at the end of the day, one of the ways to really think about what does your show bring forward that is maybe different or set a different way is thinking about what is the experience listening to it?
Dan:What are the emotions that are called forward for the listener when they're listening to it? And in order for that to happen, sound design has to really have a, a very well thought out role because it's very difficult for you have to have a Morgan Freeman type of voice to really capture somebody's attention and be, and the writing has to be excellent in order for there to ultimately not be any sort of sound designer music on a show. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah.
Dan:I don't know how you how you feel about that, but
Jonathon:Yeah. It's interesting. It's just I mean, we're off track, but it's just interesting the different kinds of audio that people listen to and how long they're willing to listen to. Audiobooks are a lot of audiobooks are amazing and they're one person. A great performance telling a story that's really well written is riveting, and those can have and those can be very engaging with no design.
Jonathon:They're clear and easy to listen to. And then these you know, in case 63, those are very short, highly designed shows, also impactful, and sound has they're both engage both can be engaging, and sound has to be flexible to be able to support different kinds of material.
Dan:Mhmm. What was it what would be your biggest takeaway from working on k 63? It was a huge show for so many reasons. And like you said, it it's been all over the world and the English adaptation was a big success for, Kimlet and Spotify. And, you have a really strong reputation in the industry for like bringing forward really heavy duty sound design.
Dan:What what would be your biggest takeaway from that project?
Jonathon:Yeah. So I love making all these big sounds for shows, but this one was I think the biggest takeaway was, just how powerful a story a story can be in any genre. And our job in this in these tasks in these kinda shows is to support that story as clearly as possible. And this you know, k 63 was a pretty, like you said, a pretty heady time jumping sci fi tale, but, at the core of it, it's a love story. And if the listeners don't connect with the actors, then they're yeah, I just wanna
Dan:do that. Thank you. I'm glad you liked it. And, yeah, I just
Jonathon:wanted to
Dan:do that.
Jonathon:Thank you. I'm glad you liked it. And, your last point reminded me of how much I I worked Mimi O'Donnell is such a pro and so cool to work with. And one of her one of her amazing skills is this pacing, that you'll hear through these shows at Gimlet and Spotify. The pacing and the editing, that makes the shows both exciting and understandable.
Jonathon:They're they're a unique set of shows that came out of that studio.
Dan:So Yeah. Totally. Anything I'm missing? Anything else you wanna
Jonathon:no. I hope, I hope this gets people thinking about sound in a fun way. This is fun. Fun thing to play around with. It really is.
Dan:It really is. I think it's the most, I I really think that I think that we're kind of at the end of the screen, domination
Jonathon:of the
Dan:last 20 years. It just feels
Jonathon:funny. Of visuals.
Dan:The tyranny of visuals. Yeah. And whether the new whatever the next technology, you know, kind of wave brings us, whether that's like, you know, total VR experiences or walking around with headsets or there's some sort of, AR overlay or whatever. I think the simplicity of people going back to just prehistoric man of just sitting around a campfire, we tell each other stories. Somebody is sitting next to you, strumming some sort of instrument.
Jonathon:That's right.
Dan:You know, or, you know, tapping on a drum. That's where mankind came from. That's where our roots are, is our histories are passed down by talking with each other through oral history. And, so just being a part in that chain of getting to tell stories and now release them digitally and being able to use sound in ways that enhances somebody's, experience, whether that's designed for education and memory or it's designed to have some sort of emotional, response. I just think it's a really cool, way of thinking about how, how what you're doing is is kind of primal to our experience as humans in a way.
Jonathon:Love it. Yeah.
Dan:Yeah. Yeah, man. Sweet. So I'm just gonna hit stop on my guy here. Okay.
Dan:Celeste, do you wanna keep going? Is there anything else you want? Hey. That's it. Thanks for listening to this episode of the gum lab.
Dan:If you're curious about anything that was talked about, we'd love to hear from you. Check us out at gumaudio.com. Ciao.