Thinking In Sound: Brian Jones on Finding The Sweet Spot

Brian Jones is currently president of BANG Music + Audio Post in New York City. After years earning next to nothing touring the US in various iterations of an indie band he joined the famed William Morris Agency in New York City working with many of the world’s biggest touring artists.

Jones later joined BANG as a composer, producer and music supervisor where he continues to create and curate music for television, film and advertising for some of the world’s most recognisable productions and brands. He records under the Artist monikers FCK MRY KLL, Beady Jay and Wasted On The Young.

LBB> When you’re working on a new brief or project, what’s your typical starting point? How do you break it down and how do you like to generate your ideas or response?

Brian> After we get the brief from the client our team always has a discussion to ensure we all understand the mission and the timeframe. Because of how quickly we need to turn things around in this business, I usually try to sketch out, however roughly, the first, best idea that comes to mind. Our other writers will do the same. Then we'll evaluate where we are and what we think we’re missing.

Once we feel like we have the primary direction covered we’ll try to push the brief into some unexpected territory that still works but is perhaps NOT what we discussed with the client.

Lastly, I always ask, “did we do the dumb one?” - meaning, have we been too clever or possibly missed the mark? If there’s a chance of that, we make sure we include something that is right down the pipe and hits every aspect we discussed with the client even if it’s a little pedestrian (because that stuff wins more often than we’d like to admit). It’s our job to be as creative as possible, but we also have to give our client what they asked for. No whiffs allowed.

LBB> Music and sound are in some ways the most collaborative and interactive forms of creativity - what are your thoughts on this? Do you prefer to work solo or with a gang - and what are some of your most memorable professional collaborations?

Brian> I typically write alone but always in parallel with our team - not only is it more fun but it’s far more interesting to hear other trusted collaborators’ ideas. As we all know, you can give the same brief to ten different people and get ten completely different ideas back, so having at least one other person to bounce ideas off is really key.

Of course there are the occasional projects where one of us is clearly the person to execute it or lead it and in those cases it becomes more of a support group than a true collaboration, but it’s always a team effort. 

One favourite collaboration was a project that we did with Accenture France. We had to create a three-part mini-symphony with a French composer and conductor, a French Orchestra and US data scientists and animators. The whole thing had to come together inside of two months when it would be performed live at the Louvre Museum in Paris. It was a seriously complicated project with so many moving parts - it all came together and was such a success that we were asked to do the same thing in Munich the next year. 

LBB> What’s the most satisfying part of your job and why? 

Brian> One of the most satisfying parts of this job is when we find the sweet spot between creating something that we truly love and that our client is ALSO over-the-moon about. It’s like we all solved a very specific riddle together.

LBB> As the advertising industry changes, how do you think the role of music and sound is changing with it?

Brian> Ideally the role of music and sound will continue to be a key role in the creative process. We know creatives and directors will always value the collaboration, but we also know there’s an AI freight train pummelling down the tracks that the bean counters (is that mean?) at brands, agencies, holding companies, etc. will try to leverage for financial savings - so we’ll just have to continue to do clearly superior work and advocate for the artistic premium that we represent.

We’ll definitely win most of those battles, but we’ll likely lose a few, too.

LBB> Who are your musical or audio heroes and why?

Brian> Too many to name without sounding silly. I’ve learned from so many artists, musicians, composers and producers over the years and I continue to do so every day. And it’s not always famous people with legendary records - it’s more often a fellow artist I admire who I can call up and say, “how the hell did you do that?!” 

Whether it's as fundamental as learning how a certain chord is voiced (thank you, Timo Elliston) or as technical as how to get a huge sub bass sound without eating all of my headroom (thank you, Nick Cipriano) there are so many generous, incredibly knowledgeable people in our business.

LBB> And when it comes to your particular field, whether sound design or composing, are there any particular ideas or pioneers that you go back to frequently or who really influence your thinking about the work you do?

Brian> Influences are strange little beasts - for me they could be anything from my older sisters’ AC/DC and Duran Duran records to discovering The Plasmatics in a bargain bin as a teenager - and certainly the old country artists like George Jones and Willie Nelson my parents would listen to.

Add in the jazz standards learned playing trumpet in high school jazz band and the obscure reggae I heard in college and it’s a pretty eclectic mix of musical trinkets lurking in the bottom of my bag of tricks. I think that’s true for most of us. When it’s all put in the blender and trotted back into the light it may not sound anything like those influences - but simply informed by them.

And really, since most of what I do is guided by a collaborative conversation with another creative who has their own influences, one of the most useful skills I can bring to the table is an ability to distil all of our collective influences into something that feels like its own, unique thing.

LBB> When you’re working on something that isn’t directly sound design or music (lets say going through client briefs or answering emails) - are you the sort of person who needs music and noise in the background or is that completely distracting to you? What are your thoughts on ‘background’ sound and music as you work? 

Brian> If I’m not making music my world is almost always SILENT. No TV, no music, no nothing. Since my daily life is an almost constant pummel of music and sound I really value the absence of it when I can get it. Of course I still listen to music for my own enjoyment but I’m normally in motion when it happens… walking, exercising, driving… whatever. When I’m still, when I’m relaxing, or focusing on reading or writing, I need silence.

LBB> I guess the quality of the listening experience and the context that audiences listen to music/sound in has changed over the years. There’s the switch from analogue to digital and now we seem to be divided between bad-ass surround-sound immersive experiences and on-the-go, low quality sound (often the audio is competing with a million other distractions) - how does that factor into how you approach your work?

Brian> A few things are true at the same time: It’s rare to experience truly high quality recorded sound unless you seek it out specifically and spend some serious dough.

For example, at BANG we create incredible Atmos soundscapes in our studios, in a purpose-built listening environment that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars or more. And we do all of that so it will sound great in theatres that also cost hundreds of thousands of dollars - knowing it will be heard by most people through a soundbar or air pods.

And that’s fine because those things sound pretty damn good. Gone are the days of low bit-rate MP3s or streaming. So I guess the bottom line is: unless the sound quality is so bad that it’s distracting me from what’s being played, I don’t even think about it. 

That said, listening to vinyl through an old 70s stereo with big old wood speakers is still a treat.

LBB> On a typical day, what does your ‘listening diet’ look like?

Brian> When I’m listening for my own pleasure, it can be anything from a comedy podcast while on the subway to a crazy range of music while I walk around the city. I do have a few mood- or genre-specific playlists that I tap into that are always evolving.

For example, I made an "Old School Metal" playlist that I had to change to simply "Heavy Shit" since I’d started to include things like old punk (FEAR) and '90s stoner rock (Kyuss) along with more modern noisy stuff like The Voidz and Deathgrips. A more recent favorite has been some of the drum and bass revival of the last couple years with artists like Chase & Status, goddard, Flowdan, etc. 

I also have an “Old Country” playlist for when I feel like cracking a cold Busch Light and staring at a wall for while.

LBB> Do you have a collection of music/sounds and what shape does it take (are you a vinyl nerd, do you have hard drives full of random bird sounds, are you a hyper-organised spotify-er…)?

Brian> Like most composers or producers in our business, I have multiple terabytes of sounds and soft-synth instruments I’ve collected over the years - and too many guitars, basses, etc. It’s probably a disease. But I’ve gotten better. Really… I have. Thankfully my hard drives are pretty well organised - I don’t want to spend my time hunting for sounds when it’s better spent writing.

LBB> Outside of the music and sound world, what sort of art or topics really excite you and do you ever relate that back to music (e.g. history buffs who love music that can help you travel through time, gamers who love interactive sound design… I mean it really could be anything!!)

Brian> I don’t think I’m unique in this, but I do hear “in colour” a lot of the time. A certain sound will evoke a distinct colour or palette in my head. The same is true for when I see certain visual art - paintings, photography - how visual art evokes mood and in turn inspires a melody or tone.

I remember learning that painter James Whistler (of “Whistler’s Mother” fame) had a similar relationship between art and music, titling many of his painted works 'arrangements', 'harmonies', and 'nocturnes' as though they were musical compositions as much as paintings. I felt I had an immediate, intrinsic understanding of his work.

LBB> Let’s talk travel! It’s often cited as one of the most creatively inspiring things you can do - I’d love to know what are the most exciting or inspiring experiences you’ve had when it comes to sound and music on your travels?

Brian> One of my fondest memories was being in the South of France during the annual Fête de la Musique. Every little town square, every park, every pub was filled with music of some kind. It was a reminder of how people really love and need music in their lives and how it brings us together. We just wandered and listened all evening.

We finished the night in the music room of a friend’s home in Cagnes-sur-Mer with each person taking turns leading a song. Everyone would join in as best they could on whatever instruments were at hand. Truly amazing.

Another great memory was hiking around St. Helen’s Island in Montreal and stumbling upon an early iteration of Piknic Électronik before it became the huge ongoing event it is now. We heard a far-off beat coming from somewhere in the trees - so we followed it - and ended up in the middle of the woods dancing with several hundred half-naked people and a DJ. Unforgettable.

LBB> As we age, our ears change physically and our tastes evolve too, and life changes mean we don’t get to engage in our passions in the same intensity as in our youth - how has your relationship with sound and music changed over the years?

Brian> I’m sure we all have friends who stopped listening to new music after high school or college - and that’s really sad. The old reworn trope that “music sucks now” is absolutely not true. I’ll concede there might be more bad music “out there” than ever, but there’s more good, surprising music out there, too. After a single listen most of us can safely skip a lot of the stuff on Spotify’s Global Top 50 because it is very same-same, just as the pop charts have always been.

But tucked in there are the occasional fun reminders of how interesting things can bubble up and find a place in our ever-growing list of influences.