Earlier this year, Tequila Avión began looking into whether sound can affect taste, and worked with audio engineer Danny Keith Taylor to take the sounds of the tequila making process to determine if aural tone affects the sensory experience.
Now, WondaGurl, the prodigy producer behind tracks from Travis Scott, Drake and Rihanna has taken the sounds, including harvesting agave in the fields, cooking it in brick ovens, distilling the liquid, putting it in barrels and bottling it, and remixed them to build on the process.
“The original audio was seven to 10 years of the tequila making process turned into 10 minutes of audio,” WondaGurl said at a listening event last week in Miami at Soundlux Audio, referring to how long it takes for agave to grow, as well as age the liquid. “You’ll experience how sound affects taste. As you listen and drink, you’ll notice how sweet and salty are amplified by high pitch and flavors such as minerals and herbs by low pitch.”
Avión’s Carlos Andrés Ramirez lead guests through a guided tasting of Avión’s Reserva 44, and new Reserva Cristalino, which included Miami Heat’s DJ Irie, Marcello “Cool” Valenzano of Cool & Dre and interdisciplinary artist Aileen Quintana.
Avión is made at some of the highest elevations in Jalisco, and since the agave endure more stress getting water and grow closer to the sun, they tend to be sweeter and fruiter than lowlands agave. Both the Reserva 44 and the Cristalino highlight agave flavor more than some other aged tequilas on the market, taking advantage of the subtle complex sweetness of the base ingredient.
WondaGurl, who has her own album of instrumental music coming out in summer 2023, said she was interested in this project that involved sound outside of music because she’d never worked on something like it before.
