Sonos joins the spatial audio revolution with the Era 300

3 April, 2023

Sonos Era 300

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There are albums and songs you hear that you just want to immerse yourself in; experience their lyrics, chords and melodies in sound that feels like it takes you right into the heart of the music. As audiophiles will already know, a recent evolution in audio is taking us one step closer to being able to have that feeling – spatial audio.

Apple Music has made the biggest headlines so far with its Dolby Atmos offerings, but the platform is far from the only player in the game here. Just last month, Sonos launched the Era 300, a new speaker that levels up the spatial audio revolution, taking it from headphones and laptop speakers to the high-quality products the brand is renowned for. In short, the Era 300 lets music lovers fill their whole world with music the way it’s supposed to be heard – rich, crisp and as close to how the artist intended as possible.

“We were listening to SZA[’s] ‘Kill Bill’,” Terrace Martin, Grammy-nominated producer to Kendrick Lamar, Snoop Dogg and more, and member of Sonos’ soundboard collective, recalls of one of his experiences listening to spatial audio recordings. “I said, ‘Let me hear it the [Dolby] Atmos way’. I [was like], ‘Woah, it feels like she’s on the couch right here next to me. I was able to get closer to the writer and the creator’s experience.”

Emily Lazar – the first female mastering engineer to win the Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical – agrees. “The Era 300 allows consumers to hear what we hear on all these big speakers in our studio,” she says of the new speaker. “It also allows us to hear what consumers hear, which is important.”

NME caught up with Sonos’ Global Head Of Music Brian Beck to get the lowdown on the Era 300, the next evolution in audio, and his recommendations for mind-blowing spatial audio experiences.

How does spatial audio and the Era 300 level up listeners’ experiences of music?

Brian Beck: “Era 300 was built from the ground up to deliver an unmatched spatial audio experience for listeners and creators alike. Unprecedented for a single compact speaker, Era 300 boasts six powerful drivers that direct sound left, right, forward and upward, delivering breakthrough audio performance that places listeners at the very heart of their music and movies. The concept of spatial audio is best explained as a sound experience that wraps you in music and fills the space around you without the need for multiple speakers. Dolby Atmos is one way to deliver a true spatial audio experience – giving you the feeling that the sound is coming from all around you. Just like the shift from mono to stereo, spatial or three-dimensional audio is the next evolution in listening.”

Spatial audio is becoming the go-to format for high-quality sound – what’s the appeal of it for both musicians and their fans?

“In the same way surround sound transforms movies, drawing you into the dialogue, action and atmosphere, spatial audio creates a sound experience that wraps you in music. Bringing this into sharp focus is the trend we’re seeing in the music industry; 85 out of 100 of Billboard’s Artist Year End Chart have released music in Dolby Atmos, and there’s over 760-plus Dolby Atmos recording studios across 40 countries – which [from Jan 2022] is an 82 per cent increase in creators using enabled studios.

“At Sonos, we want to deliver the music the artist creates in the most honest, authentic way possible to our listeners. So, we work hand in hand with the creators themselves, partnering with award-winning musicians, producers, engineers and more. We invite and integrate input on the sound of our products, and we build Sonos products to serve as a reference point for creators in the studio to ensure everything they produce sounds great in a listener’s home – so that, as a Sonos customer, you know that what you are hearing is what the artists actually hear in the studio, and what fans can also experience in the comfort of their own home.”

What are the challenges of getting spatial audio right and the process Sonos went through in creating the Era 300?

“During this development approach, one of the biggest questions we ask ourselves is ‘how do we get this into a small package?’. The first challenge with a single-unit speaker such as Era 300 is creating space so it doesn’t sound like it’s all coming from one central point – we wanted it to sound like it was coming from all around. This leads to thinking of Era 300 as a sound projector and understanding what to project. To give you some context, when we first started playing with the concept of spatial audio a few years back, there weren’t many examples of music in Dolby Atmos and there wasn’t a qualified industry standard set in place for consumer speakers, so we really were building from the ground up and creating our own path with Era 300.”

How important was Sonos’ creator community in the building of this product and how did their feedback impact the end result?

“Sound is a constant in our lives. It connects us to our surroundings, communities and culture. We watch and engage with all the developing trends and developments in music and technology – and build them into our products when we feel there’s a real benefit to the listener. For Era 300, more than 50 studios, artists and engineers such as Emily Lazar and Manny Marroquin [who are members of the soundboard] are using a bespoke studio edition as a reference speaker in the mix.

“This is a two-way process that allows us to create a better speaker for our customers – while helping creators to fine-tune their creations for their listeners. By working together, we are advancing new audio formats that transform the listening experience at home while ensuring what you hear is literally what the artist hears in the studio. We believe that today listening matters more than ever. Our vision is to make listening an experience that is charged with feeling and help our customers feel joy and vitality through their favourite music and audio content. We’re confident that these are the right products at the right moment and look forward to sharing them with our customers in the coming months.”

If spatial audio is the latest evolution in listening, how do you see audio advancing and Sonos’ involvement in this in the future?

“Although Dolby Atmos has been around for over 10 years, the general awareness is really only beginning to get started, especially now with streaming access on Apple Music and Amazon Music Unlimited offering more choices in the past couple of years. Yet, in saying this, most music listeners (and even the artists themselves) have yet to truly experience listening to spatial audio with a full understanding of why this is such an incredible advancement that’s quickly becoming a standard for new releases and older catalogues.

“With Era 300’s surgical tuning by countless engineers and Grammy and Oscar-winning mixers and producers, we now finally have the ideal introduction to this format which will provide clear as day understanding and appreciation, even changing the minds of those in the music industry who have not had the proper experience in their home setting. We are seeing that happen and are excited for how these artists will be thinking differently on their next creations based on their new inspiration and understanding of what’s possible.”