We are briefly aware of the fact that whenever we play any show or movie, Netflix has a tradition of playing their identity sound. This sound as we are now familiar with sounds something like “ta-dum”. It wasn’t decided so from the beginning. One of the executive staff members confirms that it was going to be a goat sound. Yes, we were equally surprised as you are right now. And yes, it did not sound appealing in our heads just like you right now. One thing is for sure that Netflix certainly had some creative and out of the box ideas for the same. Besides the goat sound, what were the possible options? Let us find out.
How did the “ta-dum” sound originate?
The present “ta-dum” sound was decided in the year 2015. Since then, the viewers have been made so habituated with the sound, that we certainly cannot imagine if anything besides it can fit. When TED conducted their 100th episode, it was connected to the ‘Twenty Thousand Hertz’ podcast. The main purpose of this podcast was to concentrate solely on vivid sounds. In this podcast, we even come across Tod Yellin who holds the position of a VP of Product Management. Together he was joined with Lon Bender who is a renowned editor and was previously accoladed with an Oscar for the winning sound.
They even highlighted the fact that how at one point they were close to choosing something like a lion roar as presented by MGM especially before the beginning of the show Tom and Jerry. Yellin even confronted the fact that he certainly liked the goat sound as well. Well Yellin, don’t let us judge your choices then. As with the sound of the lion, he found it to be familiar to Leo the Lion.
Above all, they had one main idea in mind. They wanted to introduce it to the audience to make them feel rejoiced and treated. The Brand Design of Netflix is undertaken by Tanya Kumar. Yellin along with her was given approximately 20-30 varied sound effects. From all of them, the current ‘ta-dum‘ was more like a wedding ring banging against a wooden cabinet in their perspective.
In spite of that, it ranked in the top three choices along with the sound of a goat and accompanied by the lively sound of an ocean. Yellin even told how they conducted the experiment about it on his daughter to gain a third-person perspective. Yellin played all the three sounds for her and the ‘ta-dum’ was immediately chosen by her which went on to become the official sound of the streaming service. What are your views of the sound being a goat sound if it were to be?
