AI and the future of music

[marvcus]

What are your thoughts on AI with respect to what it may mean for the future of music and recording?

For the most part, I don’t like it. I think AI song generation has the potential to make learning an instrument even more of a rare skill and kill creativity and talent that could have been cultivated.

Can you imagine being able to prompt a new song on the spot about whatever you want? -Give me a song about (whatever) in the style of say, Metallica, but with a guitar solo with hints of Petrucci and George Lynch. Poof—here’s your song. That is kind of crazy to think about, but it is here and up and coming.

Recording-wise, however, I can see a benefit for home recorders that say, need a drum track in the style of (insert here) by a simple prompt command. Then laying down your own stuff on top of that.

For the most part though, it feels inevitable and I knee-jerk want to reject it.

 

[Inearthed]

If we're talking like from a music industry standpoint if it is a free for all record companies will love it, eliminates the need for writers / musicians / recording studios / etc --- all the money goes directly to them. Just had it happen on the country music digital sales chart apparently

From a skills standpoint (musicianship/recording) we'll run into the same issues that they're starting to run into at the workplace --- skill regression (or at the very least stagnation), information retention, and whereas in the workplace we're talking about critical thinking it'll be creative thinking... Sure people will utilize the tools to compliment their abilities but for every one person that is using it for a track to jam over in Eminor for practice, placeholder drums on a demo, or a quick mix/master, there will be 10 that are just using it to create an entire song (like you indicated in your example) and then trying to pass it off as their own.

 

[BABMusic]

Some programs like Sibelius have already been creating music idea suggestions for composing for many years now. They are not always very helpful, but sometimes the random ideas are useful to borrow something from. As long as the voice leading is careful and your final product is wisely written, it doesn't matter really where your inspiration comes from.

Honestly, a lot of the "popular" music these days, might as well be AI. There's very little difference it seems.

 

[stephen sawall]

 

[buddachile]

My fear is that drum machines will replace drummers

 

[RaceU4her]

as a musician who records, its terrible. as a listener though, its great, i cant wait to tell the generator give me an album with these musicians. some of the stuff ive heard already is amazing

 

[rsm]

As long as AI is not trained on any Neil Young as "rock music", it's fine with me.

 

[JohnnyGtar]

Dumbest band name I've heard in a while. LOL

 

[cobrahead1030]

The potential as a tool could be really great.

Say you’ve written & recorded a few songs, and want to put a band together. How cool would it be to have some great sounding AI drums or vocals, just to give other local musicians an idea of what you’re ultimately looking for?

Unfortunately, I don’t see it trending that direction.

 

[chris lykins]

That is some sad shit that that many people would knowingly listen to that when it's essentially just a bunch of prompts fed into a program. What it demonstrates is that a large number of people simply don't give a shit and just want something playing in the background. Its insane how many streams some of these AI sites generate when bands that bust their ass get nothing and fewer and fewer people are motivated to try to make new music and make a career of it (if that's even possible anymore). So all we get are legacy acts and a continuing downward spiral.

 

[romanianreaper]

I think I hate all of it. In my opinion, it steps further into where our society already is, at 100% on the lazy as shit scale. Want a burger? Delivery it to your door. Don't have time to do your resume? Have AI quickly write it. Now this stuff.

People don't visit people like they used to, shop online, and we are all sitting with our heads in our phones. It has taken away so much from the human experience. I saw that Iron Maiden is asking folks to put their phones down for this next tour and telling everyone to enjoy the show and stop trying to capture.

I hope we devolve and new bands pop up with mistakes in their recordings and a raw sound that isn't over polished. I think AI has some cool uses but I just feel like it is turning everyone into robots.

 

[Speeddemon]

As long as AI is not trained on any Neil Young as "rock music", it's fine with me.

or any of Neil Young's "guitar solos" as "guitar solos"...

I also wonder, suppose if an actual recording artist lets AI write/compose the song, but then still record it with actual musicians, would we be able to tell that the song structure and melody was AI generated?
I hope that bubble bursts sooner than later and that a douche canoe like Sam Altman -who's perfectly fine with our planet being covered in energy waisting datacenters- gets a rude awakening.

 

[rsm]

or any of Neil Young's "guitar solos" as "guitar solos"...

I also wonder, suppose if an actual recording artist lets AI write/compose the song, but then still record it with actual musicians, would we be able to tell that the song structure and melody was AI generated?
I hope that bubble bursts sooner than later and that a douche canoe like Sam Altman -who's perfectly fine with our planet being covered in energy waisting datacenters- gets a rude awakening.

I think with AI the entire song creation process can be automated, from composing and arranging all the way through to mixing and mastering.

IDK if we'd be able to tell AI compositions from human compositions regardless of the musicians, human or AI; AI can also play human compositions. AI will continue to improve, and at a faster rate than humans.

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is a goal of the AI industry, but even smaller AI systems have shown their self-preservation, lying, subterfuge, etc. The entire industry and governments are racing to be the first to develop Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI). This will lead to mistakes, especially around control, containment and security.

Once ASI is out of the labs, and distributed across many networks, server farms and networks, etc., it may be impossible to detect, find and eliminate. The eventual outcome of rogue ASI is the enslavement or annihilation of humans, and perhaps other life forms.


I watched a video on the stages of ASI taking over; it will create "narrow AI" systems to work on dedicated problems but not be a threat. One of the scenarios is AI creating specialized fatal diseases to target specific humans it deems a threat; as robotics improves, the ASI's need for humans will diminish. Once it gains control of the means of production to create, spread and cure these diseases, it can target specific human populations, and also offer the cure if humans agree to enslave themselves to the ASI...the ASI will need humans for awhile so it will need to control and manage humans for a period of time; other means could be control of food production, and forcing starvation on various human populations, etc.,

The same control, containment and security humans need over ASI is what ASI will want over humans, to neutralize any threat from humans and to force humans to do what it wants or else face death.

 

[Sick Michael]

Not sure what I think. Some things come to mind...some of the greatest music ever used to come from 90s Computer Games, and Im not sure that was human performed.

I guess are you always looking for new music? Part of me doesnt care, I got to enjoy the bands and concerts that I like, and most new music is shit anyway, whether its AI or not.

Im convinced the best future is to live off grid in small communities, enjoying life in within these confines. Go back to analogue, turntables, homegrown food. Ban social media in your house, Embrace your family and God, get a motorcycle, rely on the government for nothing, buy a radio, solar panels, and a few guns just to be sure.

And Im saying this as someone who programs in Langchain and PyTorch 2 or 3 times a week. Not sure how thats gonna work long term...

 

[SaberRed]

My fear is that drum machines will replace drummers

But this time the machine also writes all the music, performs all the instruments, records all the instruments, mixes and masters it, creates the artwork, produces the video, writes the marketing, produces the…

 

[thegame]

I think with AI the entire song creation process can be automated, from composing and arranging all the way through to mixing and mastering.

IDK if we'd be able to tell AI compositions from human compositions regardless of the musicians, human or AI; AI can also play human compositions. AI will continue to improve, and at a faster rate than humans.

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is a goal of the AI industry, but even smaller AI systems have shown their self-preservation, lying, subterfuge, etc. The entire industry and governments are racing to be the first to develop Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI). This will lead to mistakes, especially around control, containment and security.

Once ASI is out of the labs, and distributed across many networks, server farms and networks, etc., it may be impossible to detect, find and eliminate. The eventual outcome of rogue ASI is the enslavement or annihilation of humans, and perhaps other life forms.


I watched a video on the stages of ASI taking over; it will create "narrow AI" systems to work on dedicated problems but not be a threat. One of the scenarios is AI creating specialized fatal diseases to target specific humans it deems a threat; as robotics improves, the ASI's need for humans will diminish. Once it gains control of the means of production to create, spread and cure these diseases, it can target specific human populations, and also offer the cure if humans agree to enslave themselves to the ASI...the ASI will need humans for awhile so it will need to control and manage humans for a period of time; other means could be control of food production, and forcing starvation on various human populations, etc.,

The same control, containment and security humans need over ASI is what ASI will want over humans, to neutralize any threat from humans and to force humans to do what it wants or else face death.

God 2.0. Yet another terrible human construct that will do more harm than good. I guarantee that ASI will be worshipped by some and new religions will develop in its wake.

 

[Monkey Man]

My dream is that the LLM's will be forced to trash everything they've learned and start from scratch again.

Only this time they'd not be allowed to assimilate any talented bands and artists, period.

That'll learn 'em... and save our jobs.

 

[buddachile]

I guarantee that ASI will be worshipped by some and new religions will develop in its wake.

I'm not happy about it, I want to deny it, but I think you're right.

 

[7704A]

Just watched this video from Henning Pauly describing his take on it after using some of the new AI music generator stuff coming down the pipe:

Trippy what it can do now.

But, for people making music as a means of self-expression, I don't see it as much of a threat. If I want to say something, I don't give someone a prompt with the outline of what I want. I hammer out the details myself, choosing words and cadence to fit exactly what I mean. Likewise, I don't see being able to get the level of control I want by telling an AI "make me a song somewhat sad, with hints of anger and cinnamon". Not to mention the regression-to-the-mean effects of training the models.

For people who's careers depend on making music for the vast majority of people who seem to care more about vibes and whether they can associate with the music, and who don't care about the music actually saying anything independent of their own experiences, yeah they might be screwed. Long live the underground.

Somewhat hopeful that this will clear out the radio-friendly, etc., junk and the only people left making music will be those who care about saying something, but that seems too optimistic. Anybody want to slap "Certified Organic" stickers on their album covers?

 

[Metalhex]

The future of music will be Spotify using AI to generate all kinds of music.