The New Muzak

[Pete C]

Aug. 4, 2003. 03:51 PM

Muzak to our ears
Forget about those bland cover tunes, there's a hip new indie sound in retailing


NICK MCCABE-LOKOS
ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER

There was once a time when muzak was appreciated. It soothed people's nerves when they were too scared to ride a new invention called the elevator.

Today, an instrumental version of "Penny Lane" is more likely to aggravate the nerves than set them at ease.

But new life is being breathed into a body of music that had long been left for dead.

Activaire, a New York-based company that provides mostly underground electronic music to high-end boutiques and galleries is at the forefront of what could be a muzak renaissance.

Companies like Activaire are using muzak — as in the background music that gets played in stores and malls — to build brand and identity, in co-ordination with other aspects of a store's image, like its products and architecture.

"I'm coming from an architecture background and I was working on some interior spaces and I just felt like the music wasn't expressive in the way that the architecture is," said Activaire's Laura Weisenthal, on the telephone from New York.

"And being a big music fan I knew that I could bring the music to the space."

The way Activaire does that is by taking a stylist's approach to selecting music for clients.

The company spends time learning what a company wants its aesthetic to be and how that is being presented.

"I think that the whole thing about design is that you present to the public what you want them to see," said Weisenthal.

"You don't want to go into Prada and hear mainstream radio because you're going into Prada for a different experience. Otherwise you'd just go into H&M (which sells affordable knock-offs)."

On a much larger scale, companies like South Carolina-based muzak are also taking advantage of music's ability to build brand and image. And academics like James Kellaris are exploring the ways music influences behaviour in retail environments.

"Stores will play music that not only reinforces their image, it sends a message that suggests who their target customer is," says Kellaris, a professor at the University of Cincinnati.

Among Activaire's current clients are the Guggenheim Museum and Issey Miyake's store in Tribeca. Both locations were designed by celebrated Toronto-born architect Frank Gehry.

The high-end fashion label Prada is another company Weisenthal would like to add to her roster.

In what may sound like a contradiction, she says the Prada experience isn't being offered to people who visit the New York flagship store.

The multi-million dollar Rem Koolhaas-designed structure plays cheesy dated house music, says Weisenthal.

"It's because they let the sales people put on their own CDs. For example, I think our electronica labels would do much better service to them."

Once Activaire has selected a playlist, an iPod (Apple's digital music player) full of songs is delivered to the client for $100 (U.S.) per month.

Weisenthal says the people who subscribe to Activaire are edgy and more likely to turn the music up than let it fade into the background.

They also target people who share their ideas about the relationship between music and architecture.

"Sound is spatial because it's just like light ... the terms that are used to describe light are the terms that are used to describe sound, like reflective. Things that absorb sound also absorb light. So we're interested in that connection."

The company doesn't download illegally and pays royalties on the music used. Activaire works with about 100 labels from around the world. Three are from Canada: Toronto's Suction Records, Montreal's Squirrel Girl Records and Vancouver's Nordic Trax.

"You're usually walking into a shop and hearing some blasting Jennifer Lopez," Jason Amm, co-owner of Suction Records, said dismissively.

It's only been a couple months since Suction signed up with Activaire, and Amm says it's too early to tell if people have come into contact with Suction's artists through the service.

"It's a good way to promote music. New York is a prime market for us," said Amm.

Amm said the majority of people who hear his label's music in stores would consider it muzak. But to those who recognize the tunes, the retailer would seem like it was really at the forefront of what's happening.

"One of the things that we work on is really getting to know the vision of the company and making sure that the music expresses that," said Weisenthal.

So, for example, Issay Miyake's clothes and stores present a sense of futuristic sophistication. A Nordic Trax release by Morgan Page is on the Miyake playlist. The music, with its soft organ tones and atmospheric layers, goes well with the Miyake aesthetic.

But don't expect to hear someone like Morgan Page being played in a store that subscribes to muzak, the company.

Its focus is way more mainstream.

"Every business wants to create an experience. They want to be unique from a competitor or from a similar business," said Kimberly Wolff, director of marketing for muzak, on the phone from the company's headquarters.

"What muzak does is we look for ways to create unique programs or a unique match of one of our programs to their business that will enhance their brand," said Wolff.

For clients with a national exposure like the Gap, Banana Republic or Armani Exchange, muzak will put together a custom program, said Wolff.

Smaller chains or individual stores pick one that's ready made, consisting of oldies or contemporary pop. Fees begin at $65 (U.S.) a month.

Muzak has been in the business for 70 years, and the term muzak as it's commonly understood was coined after the company's name. Muzak came up with the idea of piping live jazz music into elevators when they were first invented to calm down jittery passengers.

Like Activaire, muzak gets to know what image a company wants to present, then tailors the music to suit it.

If a store wants a fun and carefree image — just like that pink Gap blouse — they'll play fun, carefree music.

And as a muzak client, the Gap is likely to project that image by playing a techno version of a Whitney Houston song.

And Whitney is exactly what was playing when Paula Jones and her friend Eileen Watson walked out of a Gap store in the Eaton Centre this week.

Jones, 32, said she thinks the music the Gap plays presents a more grown-up image.

"They don't play the teeny-bopper tunes," she said.

Jones, from Ottawa, and Watson, a 31-year-old Toronto native who lives in Florida, are practically a case study in the impact of music on people in retail environments.

Jones will spend more time in a store if she likes the music that's playing. And the more time she spends, the greater the chance that she'll buy something, she said.

This is exactly the territory that Kellaris, the university professor, has been delving into.

"If people believe that less time has passed than has actually passed, then they are likely to linger for a longer time. For a store, that increases the probability of unplanned purchases."

But that doesn't always mean it's better to play songs that people know if a store wants to warp someone's perception of time.

Kellaris says that by playing music that's simple and unfamiliar or maybe slow paced rather than fast, people will feel like they've been in the store for less time when the opposite is true.

In a retail environment, music can actually make a shopper dumber ... sort of.

"The theory is that music engages a part of your brain in processing the music and that reduces the ability of cognitive resources to do other stuff."

That means that your mind is too preoccupied listening to a song's lyrics to be able to critically evaluate a sales pitch.

"Statements tend to be taken at face value."

Another aspect of Kellaris' work has to do with audience sorting: The idea that a store blaring thuggish rap sends a message that blue-haired oldsters shouldn't bother coming inside. Or, that if Frank Sinatra is playing in a home decor outlet, the shoppers aspire to a level of sophistication.

And it's not all theory.

Watson said that whenever she's shopping in Pottery Barn the store is playing its own custom mix of music.

"When you're in there shopping, you feel hip," she said.

Her friend Jones agreed. As soon as she hears the music in Pottery Barn, she starts thinking about candlesticks.

"The dinner party grows in your mind," she said.

[Chaz Longue]

Activaire works with about 100 labels from around the world. Three are from Canada: Toronto's Suction Records, Montreal's Squirrel Girl Records and Vancouver's Nordic Trax.

Too bad they aren't hip to Ambiences Magnetiques, Justin Time, Effendi, Songlines, and True North, eh?

[Ron Thorne]

Like I think I'm gonna hurl.

[Gary Sisco]

I already did.

I'm continuously amazed by how square the hip marketers of the day can be.

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Gary Sisco
I already did.

I'm continuously amazed by how square the hip marketers of the day can be.

I think the more hurl-inducing factor should be that...I think this kind of stuff actually works. You feel "hip" going into Pottery Barn? An electronic cover of a Whitney Houston tune projects a "grownup" image? (Remember, both of these statements came from shoppers.)

Ugh.

[Gary Sisco]

Of course it works. That's why muzak is still around (in whatever version) along with easy-listening music stations (called "smooth jazz" now). People become their parents but don't have to think so. Ain't any card-carrying hipster would be in such a place to begin with. It just isn't done.

[HenryMc]

"You don't want to go into Prada and hear mainstream radio because you're going into Prada for a different experience. Otherwise you'd just go into H&M (which sells affordable knock-offs)."

Hmmmmmmm ...does this say quite a lot about the quality of items at such places - or perhaps the shallowness of the customer??

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Gary Sisco
Ain't any card-carrying hipster would be in such a place to begin with.

Just out of curiosity, what is "such a place?" I'm pretty sure I in no way qualify as a hipster by your criteria, but I just want to know how low on the coolness totem pole I rate, in case I actually patronize some of these places.

[Jonathan Sutton]

A few months ago, I noted that I heard some classic Ornette at HEB Central Market, a grocery store in Dallas. They mostly play smooth jazz, but Blues and the Abstract Truth was on the other day.

[graypencil]

Originally posted by Jonathan Sutton
A few months ago, I noted that I heard some classic Ornette at HEB Central Market, a grocery store in Dallas. They mostly play smooth jazz, but Blues and the Abstract Truth was on the other day.

and I imagine all the Tom Thumb stores STILL play Kenny G and John TESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHH ..the did six years ago, bfore we excaped the metropleXXXX ..

up here in B/Ham ..out Haggen grocery stores regularly program the likes of Tower of Power, Tom Scott, Gerald Albright, Sanborn, and the Crusaders ..

[mke]

"Jason Amm"

hmmmm.......

[Gary Sisco]

Tanager -- "...high-end boutiques and galleries..." Gives me an art attack just thinking about it.

[Dr Dave]

Imagine this as your career: Taking in-store music very, very seriously.

I have to listen to a lot of Classic Rock and Oldies at work. It is making me hate the music I loved in my youth. Just the other day, the opening riff of "Satisfaction" came on, and I screamed "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" I think most of my colleagues were sympathetic.

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Gary Sisco
Tanager -- "...high-end boutiques and galleries..." Gives me an art attack just thinking about it.

Well, fortunately for whatever last remnants of my coolness standing still exist, I can't afford any of those.

But if I get a load of $$$ one day and want to buy my wife some Prada shoes, keep it a secret, will ya?

[mke]

New Jazz
New Muzak





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