# What is the 'sound' of reality television?



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

I have a two-part question for all of you that I would really appreciate your help with. I'm quite certain that no one here actually watches any reality tv, but maybe you've heard bits and pieces of it here and there over the years. I'm curious, what do you associate with the sound of reality television? As specific as you can... chord progressions, instrumentation, etc.

The reason I'm asking is that within reality television there is a growing trend to want to AVOID anything that sounds like reality television. This can be more difficult than it seems. If someone asked you to avoid the sound of reality television, what would you do?


----------



## AlexandreSafi (Aug 6, 2014)

Tho elements come to mind:
1)Either it could be too sentimental, obvious cliche piano and strings
2)Big boomers and percussions in scenes where something intense, yet primitive such as shout, spanks, slaps and swearing could be happening... ("i know... they all start with -s-, and no i didn't officially say "sex" yet...")


----------



## Ozymandias (Aug 6, 2014)

chillbot @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> I'm curious, what do you associate with the sound of reality television? As specific as you can... chord progressions, instrumentation, etc.



How's this for specific? :lol: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFtLvkqHIds


----------



## givemenoughrope (Aug 6, 2014)

Shakers, Pizz Strings, Trem string swells, Marimba, "Introspective" guitar

add sub bass and pots/pans and that is 90% of them. 

I'm getting asked for stuff that is "neutral", "dark", "sneaky" but each with alt endings that resolve or not. Ok, but don't use the above sounds. Ok. How? Somehow, that's how.


----------



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

Ozymandias @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> chillbot @ Wed Aug 06 said:
> 
> 
> > I'm curious, what do you associate with the sound of reality television? As specific as you can... chord progressions, instrumentation, etc.
> ...



Oh well yes there's that... though in defense of the composer, that overused sound was quite a nice effect from Steve Reid's wonderful Global Percussion library until the PRODUCERS got their hands on it and decided to toss it onto every single cut. Same thing happened with too many dozens of shows to list and the brilliant "oil can bow" sound from distorted reality. Also used in every trailer about 15 years ago. Dumb producers have no idea how much they ruin the show by throwing a cliché sound in every 30 seconds or so.


----------



## G.E. (Aug 6, 2014)

I say just make a sacrifice and watch some reality shows on Netflix.That way you can hear for yourself.The only one I've watched is "My cat from hell" and what Alexandre Safi said seems to be pretty accurate.


----------



## gsilbers (Aug 6, 2014)

tubular bells. =)

and google "vanacore" and listen to it.


----------



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

@AlexandreSafi: yes and sometimes the sound of reality tv is to make it insanely over-the-top dramatic when there's literally nothing going on on the screen, like two people are sitting deciding whether to kiss and the music sounds like a trailer for a michael bay movie.

@givemeenoughrope: I've recently been told to avoid: marcato strings, marimba/mallets, congas/bongos, anything that sounds like a 'stylus' loop, hi-hats/backbeats/especially anything with snare on 2 and 4, synths, wah guitar or tremolo rhoes or wah or tremolo anything. The thing where I'm struggling a bit is: WHAT IS LEFT?

@G.E: I'm coming at this from the other angle... I've been working in reality tv for probably most of it's entire existence, 15 years or so... I desperately need an outsider's view and help...


----------



## givemenoughrope (Aug 6, 2014)

Yea, not much left. I ask for a ref track always. But still, that type of TV is a sound but they want to keep people's attention so they want to change that sound. So, change it to what?


----------



## G.E. (Aug 6, 2014)

So it's official then.Reality TV ruined marcato strings for all of us...


----------



## gsilbers (Aug 6, 2014)

interesting. 
well, i guess it depends on what you are trying to do. i know its avoiding reality tv sound. but what are you aiming at? 
scritped tv? documentary, trailer? etc. 
i


----------



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

gsilbers @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> interesting.
> well, i guess it depends on what you are trying to do. i know its avoiding reality tv sound. but what are you aiming at?
> scritped tv? documentary, trailer? etc.
> i


Yes, well that's a deeper subject. What I'm aiming at is writing for reality tv. The current trend is that reality tv does not want to sound like reality tv. The problem is that most producers associate this with instruments, they say 'that marimba sounds like reality tv so don't use marimba anymore' when really the issue runs much deeper and probably has far more to do with the editors use of cutting music than anything else. Other factors such as their budget and production schedule factor into it. I mean there's a million things including melodies and harmonies and usage and the FX that can make something sound like reality tv. Or maybe it's just as simple that if it's use in reality tv then it sounds like reality tv music. But it's not quite THAT simple because these things follow trends and they are looking at past history. Anyway I'm rambling, the question is how to sound "fresh" and not use instruments associated with reality tv, and what instruments do YOU associate with reality tv anyway?


----------



## AlexandreSafi (Aug 6, 2014)

My first instinct when i think about combining the fresh approach and reality TV would be to use those 2 factors as an opportunity to experiment on the "electronics" and synths, i really think you could make incredible things with sound design on this one, they really are great friends for the musician, plus focus on the idea that your compositions should express good musicianship....
It's in that spirit and standard i personally feel it used to be made in those TV commercials of the 80's & 90's... 


Good luck chillbot


----------



## gsilbers (Aug 6, 2014)

im w you man. 
what got MY attention was checking out the new video game scores which rely on background style music with not much melody ala reality. games that are not too much into the "epic" thing. so like human deux, splinter cell and so on.


----------



## The Darris (Aug 6, 2014)

I didn't read the comments but Reality TV music is quite clearly canned Library music if you ask me. The styles/genre will range from sad/emotional to down right epic action within 5 minutes in any episode. Typically, they have a few track that are light hearted fillers/motif underscores that play for the general scenes.

My advice would be to check out some different Music Libraries and listen to all the genres they have to get an idea. Library music isn't something I have spent much time research so I can't be of much more help.

Cheers,

Chris


----------



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

The Darris @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> I didn't read the comments but Reality TV music is quite clearly canned Library music if you ask me. The styles/genre will range from sad/emotional to down right epic action within 5 minutes in any episode. Typically, they have a few track that are light hearted fillers/motif underscores that play for the general scenes.
> 
> My advice would be to check out some different Music Libraries and listen to all the genres they have to get an idea. Library music isn't something I have spent much time research so I can't be of much more help.
> 
> ...



A lot of how reality TV is done is not *exactly* canned music but close... many times 100s of tracks are written specifically for the show, and the end result is that a custom library is built for the show, which then the editors cut in and generally hack up. So it's like a small step up from library music... a library made specifically for the show.


----------



## chillbot (Aug 6, 2014)

AlexandreSafi @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> My first instinct when i think about combining the fresh approach and reality TV would be to use those 2 factors as an opportunity to experiment on the "electronics" and synths, i really think you could make incredible things with sound design on this one, they really are great friends for the musician, plus focus on the idea that your compositions should express good musicianship....
> It's in that spirit and standard i personally feel it used to be made in those TV commercials of the 80's & 90's...
> 
> 
> Good luck chillbot



Synths are really tough, generally people say "we don't want anything synthy" but then you give them music with synths and they love it. Everyone tends to mean something different when they say "synth". Generally it seems like pulses and percolating things-- especially in delay-- are widely accepted. But anything in your face or edgy is not. But like I said everyone has a different connotation of the word. Oddly, the word "mallet" I've noticed has the same vast array of meanings/sounds attached to it.


----------



## pkm (Aug 7, 2014)

I am probably biased as I've been writing a lot for reality tv lately, and I really enjoy a number of reality tv shows (so sue me!)

I think the stigma of reality music is more because of the editing process than the composition process. I very regularly hear great music in reality shows, but the fact that the show consists of hundreds of chopped up cues makes it a little less than desirable.

It's also the fact that the music might have been (or almost certainly was) composed with a totally different emotion in mind than it is actually used for. That's why you often hear, as I like to say, world-ending, zombie crushing, exploding cities music under a scene where you find out if someone lost one pound or two pounds that week.

I write for a company that does custom library music for specific reality shows, with a number of very talented composers, so the shows we do are not as egregious as some.

It all depends on the show, but if you try to write music that sounds like "movies", you'll be on the track away from typical reality music. Whether that's the _right_ track or not, I couldn't tell you. There's room to stray from the norm, but I hear a lot of the marimba cues get licensed more than the more out-of-the-box ones. The producers/editors get excited by the filmic music, but tend to go back to the "ol' faithful" cues more often than not.

The stereotypical "reality" music I think you're thinking of tends to fall into a few categories.

1. Big, epic, action, trailer-y, etc. - short string ostinati, loud drums, horn melodies, typical "epic" music.

2. Commercial light happy pop - quirky ukuleles, glockenspiel, high piano, toy piano, bells, whistles, la la la's

3. Coldplay/U2-style rock - piano, bass, drums, lots and lots of guitars of all kinds, big, soaring, wall of sound

4. American Beauty - two types of this, the "Dead Already" marimba + tons of strummy acoustic instruments and the "Any Other Name" open fifth piano figures over a drone. Such a fantastic and innovative score, but unfortunately the style became a bit of a cliche well within a decade of it's release. Goes to show how quickly the trends come and go. From American Beauty to the Batman movies to Inception and the Social Network, within just over 10 years.

5. Desperate Housewives - comedic music with lots of pizzicato strings, lots of stops and starts, often in lydian.

6. ...and of course many others ranging from hard rock to dance music to aggressive electronica to country to you name it. It's all out there.

Instead of trying to totally avoid these things, I'd perhaps embrace them for what they are and try to find an interesting place within, or at least related to, the genre where you can be unique. I know it's not the most artistic viewpoint in the world (this is one of the most "commercial" types of music out there after all), but follow the trends in film music so you can try to find a balance of what is in the repertoire of reality tv and what's hip outside of it.


----------



## Guy Rowland (Aug 7, 2014)

What a great post above from pkm.

I watched episode 1 of Extant the other day. Not a bad show, some thoughtful ideas and creepy moments. The big negative for me though was the music. I love Project SAM as much as the next person, but sheesh that was stark. Reading this thread, I think it retrospect the show was almost scored like reality TV. Reality TV tends to overhype every moment, whereas I was comparing with other more recent quality TV shows which tend to restrain. It felt so out of place in Extant, and I don't blame the composer - probably someone in an exec position announced with a week before delivery that everything had to be more exciting or something, I dunno. A real shame, anyway.

Breaking Bad leads the way in real drama - less is more. In reality tv, more is more.


----------



## The Darris (Aug 7, 2014)

Guy Rowland @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> Breaking Bad leads the way in real drama - less is more. In reality tv, more is more.



That could be a thread topic all on its own. :D


----------



## doctornine (Aug 7, 2014)

Guy, got to agree, Extant is pretty poor in the soundtrack department.

Whereas, UTOPIA, continues to pretty much knock the ball out of the park in terms of music/sound design. But I doubt it'll get much love around these parts…..


----------



## TheUnfinished (Aug 7, 2014)

Guy Rowland @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> What a great post above from pkm.Reality TV tends to overhype every moment, whereas I was comparing with other more recent quality TV shows which tend to restrain. It felt so out of place in Extant, and I don't blame the composer - probably someone in an exec position announced with a week before delivery that everything had to be more exciting or something, I dunno. A real shame, anyway.


This is why I can't watch Doctor Who. Every single second has action music behind it, even if people are standing around just talking. Drives me nuts.

As for Reality TV... they do tend to lurch through a million genres in one episode, but very few slip by without totally inappropriate epic music these days.


----------



## Guy Rowland (Aug 7, 2014)

TheUnfinished @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> This is why I can't watch Doctor Who. Every single second has action music behind it, even if people are standing around just talking. Drives me nuts.



Funny you should say that. I was round a friends house a while ago and Dr Who was on in the distance with the kids watching. I wasn't aware of any dialogue or dip in volume, it was just a barrage of full-on music and sound effects - after 40 minutes I recognised the end credits, and that apparently was that.



TheUnfinished @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> As for Reality TV... they do tend to lurch through a million genres in one episode, but very few slip by without totally inappropriate epic music these days.



Especially when that epic music is under low level dialogue boosted to the max. Always love that.


----------



## Saxer (Aug 7, 2014)

if i might add something to pkm's list:

7. the inevitable "funny" cute child and animal music... can't be cheap and cheesy enough... (bub ba bub ba booo - guaaa guaaa)


----------



## chillbot (Aug 7, 2014)

Very nice post pkm. Couldn't agree with you more about the editing process. It's just another hurdle in trying to create non-reality-sounding reality music.

I laughed at your list of American Beauty --> Batman --> Inception --> Social Network because I've been through it. I would add Italian Job and Tron to that list as well. About 10 years ago everyone wanted it to sound like Evanescence do you remember that?


----------



## Stephen Rees (Aug 7, 2014)

Saxer @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> (bub ba bub ba booo - guaaa guaaa)



Add another 'guaaa' and it's 'The Good The Bad and The Ugly'.


----------



## Nick Batzdorf (Aug 7, 2014)

To me the goal is always coming up with your own voice, and this is just a variation of that issue.

"Not sounding like reality television" means "we already have people who can sound like other people."

I want to be able to copy any style, but coming up with something unique is always the hardest thing to do.

That applies to everything, of course, not just music!


----------



## Zhao Shen (Aug 7, 2014)

Ozymandias @ Wed Aug 06 said:


> How's this for specific? :lol:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFtLvkqHIds



This, and the cymbal roll for when things take a turn. I bow my head in shame for having watch more than my fair share of reality TV... A lot of it was cooking though, which isn't so bad.


----------



## chillbot (Aug 7, 2014)

Nick Batzdorf @ Thu Aug 07 said:


> To me the goal is always coming up with your own voice, and this is just a variation of that issue.
> 
> "Not sounding like reality television" means "we already have people who can sound like other people."
> 
> ...



I totally agree with this! But let's just say for argument's sake that your "own voice" just happens to be that of realty tv, how do you make yourself sound different...? In theory yes I understand venturing out but in practice everyone tends to have somewhat of a "sound" to all of their music that's hard to break free from. That's sort of the dilemma... let's try not to sound like everything you've ever done? Maybe it's something as simple as a different approach to composition or as drastic as throwing out your entire template. I don't know the answer, my original intent with this post was to figure out if there was a definable "reality" sound.


----------

