The Rareform Rundown: Music, Media & Sync
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Normal, Predator: Badlands, Lessons From Ben Burtt

Normal, Predator: Badlands, Lessons From Ben Burtt

Nathan Fields
January 09, 2026

The Rareform Rundown #95

Hello Friends,

Nathan here. Hope all is well in your world and that you are doing okay wherever this finds you. I wanted to share a few recent thoughts and stories, including reflections on how the LA fires continue to affect people in music a year later, along with some sound design history and perspective from one of film’s greatest sound designers, Ben Burtt.

Let’s dive in!

New projects + music we are looking for

PROJECTS

Pumped to share that our custom remix of Lucy Michelle’s Somebody New, which I collaborated on with Darby Phillips, was featured in this spot for Normal!

Hyped to have our sound design featured in the campaign for Predator: Badlands. Huge thanks to our friends at Disney for having us on this one!

A year later, it is still pretty clear that the impact of the LA fires did not end when the smoke cleared. For a lot of people in music, recovery is ongoing because home and studio are often the same thing. When a house goes, so does the place where ideas were written, records were made, and work actually happened day to day. Those studios were not just rooms with gear, they were built slowly over time, tuned by feel, and shaped by routine. Even with help, recreating that kind of space is not fast or simple, and that loss continues to affect how people create and sustain their work.

One Year After the LA Fire: The Ongoing Recovery for the Music Community

A year after the Los Angeles wildfires, musicians and audio professionals are still rebuilding studios, replacing lost gear, and adjusting to long-term recovery. From home studios to mental health support, the fires revealed how vulnerable creative infrastructure can be and why community support remains essential. #MusicIndustry #AudioProduction #MusicCommunity #CreativeRecovery #StudioLife

www.rareformaudio.com/blog/wildfires-long-term-impact-music-industryblog-post-template-d7slz-hgppb-zndz6-6xm5p-2ma8c-56dm7-ydbb5-38r4g-nwxwz-s7pj7

Our team just put up a new blog looking at one of those film sound effects we all know, but rarely question: the “silent” gunshot. It’s been used for decades as shorthand for stealth, precision, and covert action, even though it has almost nothing to do with how suppressed firearms actually sound in real life.

The post digs into how this effect came to be, how early sound libraries and practical editing decisions shaped it, and how repetition eventually turned a workaround into an industry standard. It’s a reminder that a lot of what we think of as “realistic” film sound is really about clarity and storytelling, not accuracy.

If you’re into sound design history, cinematic language, or how small choices end up defining entire genres, this one’s for you.

Ben Burtt Explains the Surprising Origins of Cinema’s Silencer

Discover how legendary sound designer Ben Burtt traced Hollywood’s silencer sound back to 1930s bullet ricochets. Learn how cinema transformed reality into a recognisable “quiet” gunshot, shaping audience expectation for decades. #BenBurtt #FilmSound #HollywoodSilencer #SoundDesign #CinematicAudio

www.rareformaudio.com/blog/ben-burtt-hollywood-silencer-sound

I appreciate you.

-Nathan

Products

Checkout Echelon — our first cinematic sound pack built for film composers and music producers looking to level up their sound and land more placements.