Kristin Charron (00:00)
welcome back to the Sonic Truth. Today we are excited to have two guests in house. have Jay Bonilla, co-founder, creative director of the Elements Music, and Damian Escobar, global chief music officer for Havas.

Thank you both for being on today.

J Bonilla (00:17)
Happy to be here, Kristen. Appreciate the invite. Absolutely.

Damien Escobar (00:18)
It's a pleasure to be here.

Kristin Charron (00:21)
Awesome. Just for any of our listeners that are unfamiliar, did we, would you guys mind just giving a quick primer on yourself and your role and why you are excited to be here talking about all things creative and music strategy today? Jay, do you want to pick us off?

J Bonilla (00:41)
Sure, yeah. Again, I'm Jay Bonilla. I'm co-founder of The Elements Music, and we've been working with brands for many years, enlisting artists, working on brand campaigns, really leaning into the creative. We're wildly passionate about that and working with folks like Damien and organizations like Avoss to really bring brand campaigns to life through music.

Kristin Charron (01:06)
Awesome. Thank you. And Damian?

Damien Escobar (01:08)
For me, my sound journey started a long time ago. I've been at Havas for five years, but in addition to understanding how music works on the brand side, I've been lucky enough to have been an artist for a very long time. I have a deep passion for music and sound and how it moves people, just it being the greatest connection that we have. So for me, on, coming to brand side, theoretically, I've always been on the brand side, just on the artist as an artist.

but for me, it's just feeling a really, you know, a big responsibility to help, brands shape their sound story. If would sound being a greatest connector that we have, feel a deep responsibility as an artist, and now as a marketer, to make sure that that's translated at a, the highest level, which is, brand communication. So working with, incredible.

talents like Jay and Elements team and other partners is something that I'm super passionate about. So definitely looking forward to continuing that journey.

Kristin Charron (02:09)
Awesome. Thanks for that. That's actually a perfect segue into my first question for you, Damian. Music is one of the most powerful cultural connectors. How do you see brands using it today to build deeper emotional and cultural connections with their audiences?

Damien Escobar (02:24)
Yeah, you know, it's the greatest connector that we have and it's an asset that's very underutilized. And if we can lean into the idea that at the end of all communications are people. And if we look at where marketing is moving to, which is primarily social and digital marketing, sound is crucial to those platforms.

Um, so, you know, what we're seeing now is a lot of brands are leaning into it and we see the brands that have clear sound stories. They're winning in culture in a big way. And for a brand to survive, I don't care if it's a healthcare brand or if it's human marketing brand, you have to play in the culture. And the only way to play in the culture is to be able to be there authentically. Every brand doesn't have the right to be in culture. You have to earn that right. Um, having a clear sound strategy and story and it's, is the first step, uh, in that process. I say it's the first step because I'm biased.

within my role, but it's something that is very, important for every brand to actually have leverage and capitalize on.

Kristin Charron (03:23)
sure. And Jay, the Elements is known for balancing creativity with strategic objectives. How do you approach that in music composition and sonic branding with your clients?

J Bonilla (03:32)
Yeah, I mean, on the custom music side, which is a big part of our business and what we're doing day to day, I think a key to that is us getting into the discussion really early with the brand or the agency, with the ideation phase. The reason that's important is because it really allows us to foster that organic alignment between the brand, the product, and then ultimately the talent, like the artist that we're going to enlist.

to come in and work alongside to create the sound, the track, the song, whatever it is we're creating for that brand campaign. We've had instances where we are brought in early and we're able to really nurture that process early on. And I'll give you an example, working with an emerging artist, for instance, on a brand campaign, that alignment is there, they have passion for the brand.

passion for the project, we end up getting in the studio, starting to create for the project and agencies there, clients there, and things really start flowing. And because there's that alignment and the artist has the passion for it, they end up almost becoming like another creative director in the room. And they light up and they start throwing cool ideas into the mix that weren't even there before. they're like, let's go over here. I know this cool spot in Venice that we can...

kind of film some ancillary stuff after we do our session in XYZ. And it just sort of lights the whole process up. And then on the other side of the coin, we've been involved in projects where, you know, maybe we're handed an artist, maybe it's a major label artist, maybe it's an emerging artist to work with on a project. We weren't able to kind of foster the alignment there. And it becomes clear that that project, you know, the artist is there maybe for a paycheck or, you know, there's just not, that whole lighting up process isn't there. So.

Yeah, that's huge. And then on the Sonic branding side, I'd say we really focus on trying to meet the brand where they're at. mean, these projects can be really, really intense. Some brands come to us and they've spent months and months and months across a ton of their teams really thinking about who they are, what they want to sound like, know, just really thinking things through and coming to us with a fairly fully formed brief. And they just want us to jump kind of right into the creative process and we'll

We'll meet them there. We'll jump in at that process. Other brands come to us and they want us to really strip it back to the studs in terms of what that process is. And we'll kind of literally start from the beginning. We'll talk to brand historians. We'll talk to a ton of stakeholders across a ton of departments in the brand. We'll bring in music psychologists. We'll bring in potentially a major label to ideate about cool partnerships we can do with artists or ways that...

Brands can sponsor live music events or that type of thing. So the key for us is to really meet the brand where they're at and not try to superimpose a one size fits all process on the sonic brand process overall.

Kristin Charron (06:26)
Mm-hmm.

Damien Escobar (06:26)
Kind of

back off what Jay said, if I may. I I love actually love a lot of what Jay just.

just said, right? Because it runs parallel in the overall approach that we have here at Havas to sound. One thing Jay touched on was artists having an affinity, right? An overall affinity for the brand. I think that's key. I think where a lot of brands go wrong, when we think about original music, it's just about getting the brand and getting an artist and just barring their equity. And we don't see anything long-term in that. It comes out, it's cool, and it kind of disappears. But when you're aligning,

the right artist with the brand, right? And a lot of that goes into just the overall psyche. Who are we talking to? Who are we targeting and why? There's the strategic approach is the same as strategic approach on any brand strat, whether it's during brand planning or at the outset of the project. Music is no different, right? You have to understand who you're targeting, who you're talking to, what they're listening to and why that way you're able to get to work that actually works.

You know, so what Jay is saying, if you have on the agency side, if we can have all that defined before we go to, say, an elements and Jay and his crew of, hey, these are the affinity artists we're thinking about. And here's why. Not just because we're looking to borrow equity, but because we know they'll actually resonate deeply with our audience. And this is an artist that has a natural affinity for this brand. Now we're looking at longer partnerships versus just

Versus than just doing a one-off. That's where we can start to spin off those separate ancillaries and experiential ideas, and it becomes something that actually works in culture. So Jay, you hit the nail on the head from your perspective. And it all works in tandem. Kristen, that's how you really get to work that actually works on a higher level.

Kristin Charron (08:17)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I think it's apparent the long-term impact of something more holistic like that, where it's very cohesive and a lot of planning went into it as opposed to just a one-off. That was a perfect segue into my next question, which was, what are some of the biggest mistakes brands make?

when thinking about selecting, commissioning music, is there anything else that either one of you would add to that? Or you think really it's not thinking long-term and holistically about what they select?

J Bonilla (08:49)
Yeah, I I think it's, I was gonna say it's sort of the other side of that coin of, you know, me saying that bringing us in early is key. know, treating music as an afterthought is the way not to do it, you know, especially on projects that are kind of have some complexity to them that may have an artist component or, you know, where the music is very integral to the campaign. You know, you'd think that that always means that we...

Damien Escobar (08:49)
That will be, go ahead Jack.

J Bonilla (09:14)
the music partner gets brought in early, but that's sometimes not the case. And it really does just, it robs that process and that project of that early ideation and that thinking about sort of artist brand project alignment in the way that needs to happen.

Kristin Charron (09:27)
Thank you.

Damien Escobar (09:29)
I agree with Jay. I agree with Jay wholeheartedly. think a lot of brands fall victim to fast culture, right? We know in our business is fast culture and there's slow culture. Fast culture being reactive, right? The Muir thing was a trend. Everyone jumps on it. They all want to be a part of that conversation, which is fine. I think when you look at something like long-term partnerships, it has to be more of slow culture. There has to be more strategy in play. Brands dive in immediately, like I said, and they just borrow equity.

There's nothing wrong with bar and equity, but what are you bringing to the table? Right. I much rather see our brands create their their own sound story, have their own equity, because what ends up happening is it changes from, this is such and such brand, you know, whatever artist. It then becomes more of a feature. Right. I kind of tie everything back to music. It then becomes Havas featuring this person versus this person, this person featuring Havas. So

There's nothing wrong with bar and equity. think we're leaning too much heavily into the celebrity trend. There's nothing wrong with borrowing equity when you have your own equity to bring to the table. So I think brands need to take a step back, reevaluate their sound strategies and realize it is literally going to be the largest asset that we have and it's severely underutilized. And that's why I'm here at Havas.

Kristin Charron (10:48)
And you bring up a good point about equity and leveraging celebrities. Obviously a big part of the conversation of what's happening in audio and advertising at large today is around AI and the use of AI. As it relates to the future of music for media, how do you see AI and data enhancing or challenging the creative process?

J Bonilla (11:09)
You know, having a lot, I'm sure you would say the same thing on your end, Damien, having a lot of conversation and debates kind of internally, externally around this, lot of interesting conversations really. And I think, you know, one of the realities we're seeing on the ground in terms of as music creators is that a lot of the composers and artists that we're working with, they're already deep into using, you know, some of the bigger LLMs in terms of ideation and experimentation and kind of

prompting and seeing what it comes up with and being like, wow, that could be something I could flip or that's cool. So it's here in terms of, in some respect, in our process. I mean, think in terms of where it's going and the question of, it start sort of replacing some human composers and artists? I think once...

the couple major LLMs get over the legal hurdles that they're kind of embroiled in right now with the major rights holders. I do think that there will be a day where, you know, if you're a music person at an audience here, at a brand, that maybe you go to one of those platforms, if you've got something that you just need like a simple background track. There's not a lot of interaction and complexity with how your music's gonna be interacting with your visual.

Maybe you go prompt something and maybe you come up with something cool and maybe you end up using that, you know, if you can legally use it. But I think, you know, where we've been going with our company over the past several years, a lot of this has been intentional is more and more, you know, we're working on artist partnership projects. We're working on projects where we're bringing in, you know, emerging artists. And in those projects, there's a lot of complexity, you know, not only in the relationship between the music and whatever the visual medium is, but also

in working with teams like Damien's and the back and forth and sort of the gut that it takes and the intuition that it takes on a human level to kind of have that back and forth and to really understand each other and what is really needed for the project. So I don't think that stuff's going anywhere anytime soon, but I do think there will be some tears of the music for media business that are really very, very directly affected sooner than later.

Kristin Charron (13:20)
Do you mean anything to add to that?

Damien Escobar (13:20)
I agree.

Yeah, no, Jay hit a lot of great points. Just looking at it from just our side, just agency side, AI is here and it is leveraged in a major way. It doesn't matter where holding company you're at. I think initially when AI came on the scene and I'm a musician as well, so I'm always thinking from a musician standpoint, it was absolutely terrifying.

And then as you kind of learn about it more, you just realize that AI is like having a writing partner in a room. I think there's nothing that can replace the human touch on music. Now, AI, you know, it's getting a lot more advanced and it's becoming...

It's becoming absolutely incredible. But I still strongly feel that nothing replaces that human touch. I can tell you here at Habas, you know, there are no plans to leverage AI to do anything in our music. And I think a great, a big part of that is

You know, there's a certain level of integrity when it comes to music that must be maintained. There's certain areas where you can cut and you can kind of cut spending in certain areas. But music is one of those things if it's done right and it's done the right way.

it should be paid for and it's a significant value add. And when you think about in the larger scheme of things, when you think about large budgets for productions, music will always be a relatively small line item in comparison to other items. So we don't necessarily need to diminish that even further. But I do think that having a writing partner in a room is absolutely nothing wrong with that. And I see a lot more teams embracing it from that perspective.

J Bonilla (14:58)
Yeah. I'll just, I'll add to real quick, you know, I've kind of gone in the last year, there have been moments where I'll go down the rabbit hole and I'll jump on Suno or Udi or something and, you look at the stuff on the front page. And, and there was, I had a particular instance maybe about a year ago where for the first time after having done that for awhile, I ran across something where I was like, dude, this is dope. Like this is kind you know, for whatever you want to think about all of this, I would add this to my playlist and it's kind of, it's hot, you know, so.

Damien Escobar (15:19)
Mm-hmm.

Kristin Charron (15:20)
Thank you.

J Bonilla (15:26)
That was, I kind of, that took me a little further down that rabbit hole. But then I found myself a couple of days later, I kind of revisited some of my, general playlist stuff. And I think it was like a Yabba song or something I came across. And I was like, okay, like this is, it reminded me how, how, how far apart we still are and how the, the feel of human, you know, the human music is just, you're a hundred percent right, Damon. I think it's going to be, if it ever gets there, it meaning, it meaning AI, it's still, it's it's a ways off now, you know.

Damien Escobar (15:26)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Kristin Charron (15:42)
Mm-hmm.

J Bonilla (15:54)
So I was comforted by that moment of sort of being re-immersed in what music actually is now, you know, on the human side and being like, wow, yeah.

Damien Escobar (16:01)
And but just

to build on that, mean, it's. But that's why, you know, we think about music, we think about sound, you know, one thing in one area that I preach, you know, to our brands globally, let's think about music as the platform and not music, just support in the platform. You know, we think about I think for far too long, music has been utilized just as a production asset for.

pretty much every brand, except for the ones that we see out in culture doing really good jobs with it and having platform ideas of music. But there is the opportunity. And I think that's when you start to separate from what's happening in AI right now of just on a production music level. When we start looking at music as a real asset to solve problems for brands, and I can see it going there, that's when you're taking it a step further and you're staying ahead of the curve. Right?

I like it. One, since I like it, I like AI coming in because it pushes status quo, it challenges people to think differently. And when that happens, that's when change happens from that perspective and that point, right? Sometimes change is born out of fear, you know? So if that's what it takes to get folks thinking differently about, you know, how we utilize and leverage that asset, I'm all for it.

Kristin Charron (17:11)
I love that. I love that, that. And how do you see the role of music evolving and brand storytelling over the next few years?

Damien Escobar (17:19)
JL at you, Kiko.

J Bonilla (17:20)
Yeah, I know, I mean, one thing that I know is happening out there is kind of coming out of pandemic, people are definitely, especially young people, really looking for a connection. you know, I think in that IRL sort of experiential space, think brands are and should be more and more looking there for, you how they're showing up in those kind of spaces. I mean, we we did a project recently.

We did sound for a show at the Sphere in Las Vegas. And just kind of seeing the, you know, the grandeur of that and seeing all these people coming together and enjoying sound and music in a new way was, you know, sort of an eye opener. And I think that's certainly one place, you know, where brands are to be going. I think the other thing is just more of a continuation of what we've seen happening for really decades now in the music for media space. And that's moving more and more toward real, like kind of air quotes, real music.

and, and music that is, you know, where there's not this big chasm between music made for brands, music made for media and records that we love and, know, by artists that we love. It's really like the gap has been closing on those two things. They used to be different species, you know, a few decades ago. And now all the projects we do, that's the ethos.

that we put into them. And it always has been for our company. And this is sort of the entry point for us as a company is just being obsessed with the projects that we're doing for brands, feeling like records, tasting like records, smelling like records. know, when it's, when the campaign is released, we want people on YouTube being like, Hey, where can I get, where can I get this record? What record is this? Even if it was just a 15 second piece of music or a 30 second piece of music that we did for a brand. So I think that is, you know, where brands will continue to go for sure. You know, just

authenticity and realness.

Damien Escobar (19:05)
I agree 1000%. Um, I mean, the only thing I would add, I mean, you hit every note that I would would have said, only thing I would add. And we think about when we look at just the digital landscape, right? URL. It's I think there was a, there was a recent, um, study that was put out and I think they said something like over the next

Ten years or so, linear TV, that big spin, that big media buy, brands are gonna switch that over to social. And we're already seeing it happen up here at Havas. And understanding that social is culture, right? And understand what moves culture, sound, music, right? So.

Again, going back to that earlier point, right, and evolving that brand storytelling, brands have no choice but to leverage and lean into having a clear strategy, which is going to inform that output. So to Jay's point, one of our brands, OGX, we did a partnership with Demi Lovato, and it wasn't, I'm like, now, I don't want to do some cheesy ass song. I want to do an anthem.

J Bonilla (20:06)
you

Damien Escobar (20:07)
that can really show up in culture and folks are saying, throw it on Spotify. And that happened. And that's something that elements specialize in. That's exactly where brands are going. It's that we want something that's authentic. We want something that's really going to resonate deeply with the consumer. And it should sound like something that's already happening in culture. Great example, Coke Studios, like what they've done in the Asian market. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Like a lot of the records that they put out over there, I mean, they were...

on their charts in Asia, like top fives, know, like top fours and that's, these are brand releases, you know? So I think a lot of brands are going to start moving there and it's because of the URL experience. Like there's no choice. It's either evolve or get left behind. Everyone wants to get younger and for a brand to survive, you have to get younger. You have to target Gen Z and Gen Z is a, is a subset of

consumers that are deeply ingrained into movement, community, innovation, and authenticity. So brands are not going to have a choice. It's either you got to meet them there you're going to get left behind. Because there's a new brand popping up every damn day that's not a major, that becomes a major, because they're leaning into these attributes that really resonate with that specific target.

J Bonilla (21:21)
Yeah, I just added that. think, you know, this is evolving in the brand space to such a degree that an example that we came across that was just like kind of a dream example for us about a year ago is we, 7-Eleven reached out to us and we ended up working with Flow Milli to basically just make a record and a music video. Like there was no, that was the brief. It was like, we want to make a record. And, you know, for us again, that's just.

Kristin Charron (21:25)
Okay.

J Bonilla (21:48)
That's the dream scenario. to me, it's sort of the, to Damien's point, it's really where brands are

evolving to is thinking about music as a platform and not just a little piece of the puzzle. So I think more more brands are going to be doing those types of projects.

Kristin Charron (22:04)
And with leveraging music, of course, comes the conversation around how to measure it, how to measure its impact. What should brands be paying more attention to when measuring the impact of music and their campaigns? Damien, did you want to, you're laughing. Did you want to kick this one off?

Damien Escobar (22:21)
Are they talking about it in the group chat? That lets you know the impact of it. mean, is, know, music is different than typical linear, you know, other brand kind of attributes. Yeah, there's tons of measuring tools that are out in the world. There are tons of tools we have. to be real, to be honest with you, like we have these tools because we know brands need to quantify an investment.

But the reality is, if something's working, when we're thinking about music and records, it's going to show up in culture. It's going to go beyond the intended use. They're going to utilize it for something else. They're going to take it and make it their own. So when you're measuring success, and I think that can go for any kind of brand asset, A, one question I'll always ask is, are they talking about us in the group chat? If you made the group chat, you made it. And a great record will do that. It's like, hey, have you heard this song?

So yeah, we can quantify with data, but the real measuring tools is how's it showing up in culture? And you'll know, you'll know exactly if it's working or not. And I think a lot of people know the difference between organic and paid. Is it organically showing up? Is it organically resonating?

Kristin Charron (23:15)
So true.

J Bonilla (23:31)
Yeah, I think Damien hit on the head. You know, I'm not sure how much to add to that, but I think that that's again, like I alluded to before, that's always what we're looking for when a campaign is released is kind of like what's the word on street? You know mean? Like, is it resonating as something that's authentic and that people want to go seek out further? Or is it just kind of like, okay, that, you know, that was a piece of music that was clearly composed for this. And, you know, I'm not too interested in it beyond its use in this media.

Kristin Charron (23:36)
Okay.

Mm-hmm.

J Bonilla (23:58)
We're always going for the former and something that's going to have further resonance beyond just that kind of initial usage.

Kristin Charron (24:05)
Absolutely. I love that. think that it's so true. Jay, Damian, this has been an incredible conversation. Thank you both for sharing your expertise and perspectives on the power of music and branding from the balance of creativity and strategy to the evolving role of AI. You've given us so much to think about when it comes to how brands can use music to create deeper connections and how to measure it.

Is there any parting words that you'd like to leave our listeners with around the power of audio and creativity and how important all this is to keep in mind?

Damien Escobar (24:42)
you know, from my perspective, I would just leave folks with don't know what complicated is just music, you know, and please stop saying music is subjective. It's only subjective until it works.

J Bonilla (24:52)
Yeah. Hear, Yeah, no, totally.

Kristin Charron (24:53)
You heard it here.

Jay, anything to

add to that or any parting words from your end?

J Bonilla (25:00)
You know, I think it's just, we're excited about continuing to kind of lead the charge on, again, you know, trying to close the gap between music made for media that sounds fake, that doesn't sound authentic, and the music that we all listen to every day by the artists that we love, that, you know, kind of is a soundtrack to our life. We want to...

Kristin Charron (25:16)
Mm-hmm.

J Bonilla (25:24)
make those things one of the same, essentially.

Kristin Charron (25:26)
Absolutely. Well, thank you again, both for being here. Hope to have you on again soon and to everyone tuning in. Thank you for listening.

Damien Escobar (25:35)
Thanks so much, Kristen. Thanks, Jay.

J Bonilla (25:37)
Thank you, man. was a pleasure. Thanks so much, Kristen.

Kristin Charron (25:39)
Thank you.

Damien Escobar (25:40)
Take care, guys.