Consol Glass goes sonic with Howard Audio

The brief was for the mnemonic to be distinctly Consol; so Howard Audio went to the source - the flagship Consol store in Woodmead, where we spent a day experimenting with different ambiences of glass products. We selected around thirty products and brought them into our audio studio to record the sounds of the glass. Our audio vision, so to speak, was to brand Consol by using the actual products themselves. A sonic identity - to sign-off on all their communications - through the power of sound.

Before we recorded the sounds, however, much planning and experimenting with pitch and notes had to be conducted. As each glass product would have its own pitch, we decided on a certain key and adjusted each product, usually by adding water into the product to change the pitch. This put us in a good place to start experimenting with the different pitches at the composing stage. Each product was recorded many times, labelled meticulously and saved in the computer.

We had to get creative in the recording studio using many mic techniques, specifically a contact mic that could literally get right inside the heart of the product. Each glass product had its own unique identity and the sound changed depending on what beaters we used - where we hit, rubbed or blew the glass - glass is such a versatile and musical medium.

Initially we started experimenting with Musical Cryptography - a system that uses a sequence of musical notes that can be taken to refer to an extra-musical text by some 'logical' relationship, usually between note names and letters. We played around with what the initials C.O.N.S.O.L would spit out - and this gave us a mnemonic melody of 6 notes. We played around with this over some historical Consol projects – TV Commercials and radio spots – but it was felt that the mnemonic was a little too “musical” and took too long. We looked at using fewer notes and consensus was reached on a sonic mnemonic that reflects the brand assets of Consol and will be be used on all marketing going forward.

It took us several weeks to create a two second mnemonic, but we hope that the work and passion that went into creating this bespoke audio branding for Consol reflects the brand’s passion for connecting with their customers.

Check out our "behind-the-scenes" video for insight into this exciting project.