Original Music and Sound Design by Radium Audio

Radium is commissioned by agency JWT to work with director Jon Yeo to create the soundtrack for the new Trident Neon Fu tv commercial. When we see the initial storyboards with the japanese influenced fight sequence, we imagine the thunder of traditional Japanese war drums pounding underneath a highly stylized and futuristic sound design action narrative, a sonic infusion of the ancient into the now, a Neon Fu acoustic flavorburst…

See below for

  • Indepth narrative
  • Soundfiles – electronic vs live taiko drums
  • Short flim from the taiko recording session

As we work on the soundtrack, everyone loves the result from our standard studio production tools and instruments with sampled taiko, but we can’t escape the feeling that only live taiko drums will really do the project justice. So we ask around, and we are put in touch witih Joji Hirota, a highly respected japanese taiko artist, and arrange to go along to one of his rehearsals with his troupe. When we see and hear them in action, we know immediately that we have to bring the intensity of the live taiko drums into the Neon Fu project, and so we invite Joji to a live recording session to recreate and reinforce our studio drums on taiko.

As well as Joji’s own drums, we also bring in the 54″ hybrid taiko bass drum which was featured in the Harry Potter movies – it’s so massive that we struggle to actually get it through the doors into the recording studio. It takes a little while to find the correct positions for the microphone recordings to capture the full sonic range of the drums without distortion from the sheer intensity of volume. Joji quickly gets familiar with our track, and we’re all a little awestruck by the raw power of his performance and his command of his art. When we edit in the live taiko and compare the new track to the previous, we can really hear and feel the strength of the percussive boost we’ve injected into the sonic aether of our Neon Fu world.

Listen to the difference between the taiko samples and the live taiko recordings

Radium-Audio ยท Taiko Drumming – Trident Neon Fu

 

Behind-the-Scenes: Peter records live Taiko drums with guest artist Joji Hirota