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The clink of the bottle. The click of the ring pull. The first hiss of air. The crackle of bubble clustering to the surface. As iconic as Coca-Cola’s visual assets are, its distinctive sounds are as much part of the brand experience. That’s why their latest project, Coke Soundz, is putting fizzy phonics front and centre.

Coke SoundZ  is a digital instrument that takes  distinctive Coca-Cola sounds and uses AI to allow users to unleash their inner DJ and create their own bubbly beats. It was developed by WPP OpenX, led by AKQA US. The sounds were recorded using binaural microphones and a team of scientists and producers used artificial intelligence to analyse which sounds were the most optimistic, to include in the final design.

The instrument takes the shape – of course – of the iconic Coca-Cola bottle. Pads, buttons and a twisting lid allow users to generate their own rhythms. It’s been sent to influential music producers, DJs and creators, who can use it in their compositions. And for those who haven’t hands on a physical version of this new instrument, there’s also a virtual version of it in the form of an AI-driven app that allows anyone to give their content an extra fizz. 

“We’ve always been involved in music, but not in that way,” says Islam ElDessouky, global vice president of creative at The Coca-Cola Company.  For many years, the company has amplified artists with platforms like Coke Studio, but now the brand is becoming part of the music.

The roots of the project lie in a conversation inspired by a previous campaign for Coke Zero Sugar. ‘The Best Coke Ever?’ is all about letting the product’s taste ‘speak for itself’ in order to drive trial. In the most recent campaign, they used AI to generate letters from the bubbles and drops of condensation, which were then used in the ads. “We were talking about ‘the taste that could speak for itself. And that triggered the thought – what does that mean? That it speaks for itself? How can we bring this into a sonic experience that people can actually enjoy?”

As the team started to explore the sonic side of the brand, they discovered an intriguing phenomenon, binaural beats. It’s a pulsing sound that arises when one hears two similar sounds played at slightly different frequencies to each ear. This phenomenon has been found to elevate mood, which syncs up perfectly with Coke’s innate optimism. They then figured that they could use artificial intelligence to drive the experience, so that even the most musically inexperienced user can input prompts to create sick beats.

The project started as an experiment and Islam says the team has been blown away by seeing the almost childlike wonder that arises as people give it a go. “At the beginning, we were shy: ‘do we send this to many people or not?’ We were not so sure. But then we started seeing the reaction. It is so innocent and so light hearted, which is pretty much on-brand!” he says. As they saw the reaction, they realised that they needed to make the experience even more accessible.

As much as this is, in many respects, an exercise in engaging with fans in a new way, Coke SoundZ has also had a surprising impact internally. Even before the official launch of Coke SoundZ, the team has been using the instrument on the soundtrack of Coke Zero Sugar’s 2024 campaign and they’ll be using it in future projects such as event soundscapes and Coca-Cola music campaigns.

According to Islam, the decision to use Coke SoundZ on Coca-Cola's own projects and ads is a manifestation of its authenticity. "Yes we want to uplift, yes we want to connect people, but I think authenticity is perhaps the toughest one to crack and, perhaps, the easiest to see. We try as hard as we can to stay original and to stay authentic. I think people can tell the difference. Sometimes it is hard because brands originally were created to be perfect, were created to be bulletproof, not vulnerable, not human. Like perfect organisms that are supposed to manifest in all their glory. So when you go and talk to the creative crew or the sound designers and say, ‘hey can we use this in our ad’... it’s not easy to work with these things.”

As with the earlier Coke Zero Sugar campaign, where AI was used to create the lettering on the ads, Islam acknowledges that the creative instinct is to keep control of the craft and use the regular tools like Photoshop. However, to create a tool and act as if it is good enough for the consumer but not good enough for the brand would not be true to Coke’s authentic values. 

“You want to walk the walk. We don’t want to tell people that, ‘we’re giving you an instrument to play but I cannot use it, it’s amateurish, it’s for you’. Let’s use some of it as well.”

Islam is finding that Coca-Cola’s authenticity value is resonating particularly strongly. “Everything is so mixed up and it is very hard today to see what is credible, what is authentic, what is not, and that generated a lot of scepticism overall. I think the solution to address the scepticism, even the pessimism to some degree, is to go back to authenticity and be very, very, very serious about it… This is where the brand was always successful. I think people always felt that with Coca-Cola, when we do something it comes from the heart and people resonate with it.”

The other brand value that this campaign resonates with is optimism – specifically Coca-Cola’s deliberately upbeat and optimistic attitude to artificial intelligence itself. As a company they’re incredibly mindful about intellectual property and the untested legal implications of using open source tools, so instead they’ve been focusing on creating safe sandboxes and tools trained on their own assets for their own teams and the wider public to play with.

"I think that the essence of it is we see it as another tool or another vehicle for connecting people to communicate and have a better life, if you will, as simple as it sounds and as cheesy as it sounds as well. Before AI people were talking about the metaverse. Before the metaverse we had social. Before social, we had digital. You always find two camps. You find a camp that is quite pessimistic about things, that it is going to change us for the worst. And you have others who are like, ‘ok, let’s see what benefits it can bring us’. I think Coca-Cola is such an optimistic brand. We want to experiment with things and put them in the right perspective.”

And as Islam marvels, this smart, safe, new instrument has also unlocked something in himself – not as a marketer but as a human being. “I don’t play any music, I have zero valuable contribution to make to the music world!” he laughs. “So, when you have an aid like this in your hand that helps you make a beat it makes you feel, ‘oh! I can create sounds now!”.