I have a very pragmatic view on music: all I care about is whether it sounds good or not. That’s it. That’s literally it. And from that standpoint the advent of AI music has been a major net positive for me.
You can choose to ignore that and come tell me about the ethics of using AI or how you care about the story behind the song and so on and that’s all fine but just note that you’re no longer addressing what I’m actually saying here.
I’m also not claiming it’s great - only that it’s good. I’ve yet to discover an AI song that I go back to like I do with many human-made songs but if I want to put on a playlist playing in the background then one consisting of entirely AI-made music reliably provides me well above average track after another whereas with organic music I need to sift through a ton of absolute crap to stumble upon the occasional good track that still rarely exceeds what AI is able to output. I can go on YouTube and put on a 2 hour playlist of Jazz House or similar and I don’t get the urge to skip a single track.
Currently I feel like where AI still trips is lyrics - they still are only plausible sounding nonsense once you actually start paying attention to it but especially for instrumental music it has far exceeded the level of a good average human artist.
Few examples of what I’m refering to: with vocals and without.
I can’t wrap my mind around this at all. Music is the result of people making music. If there is no artist, no perspective or feelings it’s just sounds.
Sure I can’t sing, so what I as an average person make could not even charitably be called music either, but that is not the point - I want to go to concerts and see bands play music, and want computers to do grunt work that people don’t want to do, so that more of us can do better things.
Using an AI to make musical sound just undermines all that. Tech in music being wielded by humans, yes that is music (DJs) and if machines ever develop sentience I will call their sounds music, but not before.
Have my upvote.
“it’s just sounds”
So, straying from the conversation about AI music being good or whatever. This is the part of AI music that perplexes me the most. So like… Audio is a wave. You can take a sine wave, and a square wave and layer them on top and you get a sine wave with some square edges because it’s both sounds. Different frequencies for different pitches, all of that.
When AI makes music, is it just drawing that wave? If so, that’s fucking crazy. Like I could understand if it used some ingested music theory to write chords and a melody, then turn them into MIDI, then run those through a synth plugin. But AI doesn’t have a synth plugn. It just knows what a synth plugin sounds like through analasys of sound waves, right? Like AI can’t “hear” music. It doesn’t know what a cello sounds like. It just knows what the sample point values of a waveform of a cello sounds like. But then if you tell the AI to add an instrument. Let’s say an electric guitar. It knows how to re-draw that wave to actually make that sound. To add reverb? To add compression? Then more instruments?
If that’s how it actually works, that blows my god damned mind. No human could ever write a song by drawing a line on paper and scanning it in. I suppose they could, but it would be some avant garde experimental thing, not something that sounds like actual instruments. Like I don’t think a human could ever figure out how to draw the sound of fingers sliding down the frets of an acoustic guitar between the actually strumming of a guitar.
It’s fucking bonkers.
When I say music I mean sounds that are intended to sound musical, or melodic or whatever. A kid banging bottoms of pots and kettles with wooden spoons counts as music in this definition. I’m describing a kind of sound.
The sounds AI is able to produce are in some cases such that I enjoy listening to. I’m not a music connoisseur, I’m just a person who likes hearing some sounds more than others. You likely define music differently as well as consume it on a whole different level and that’s fine. I’m simply not that into music. I relate to food in a similar manner. It’s fuel - if it also tastes good, let alone is healthy, then that’s a bonus.
I simply view the gatekeeping and hating a bit silly.
I know, right? Wtf is wrong with these people. It’s the PRODUCT that matters when it comes to music, not the meaning, message, artist or intent, right? Who cares who created the song, or what instruments the song was made with, or even what the song is about. All I crave is acoustic tones arranged in a pleasing manner. Message? Morals? Emotion? Bah, who needs that shit? If Hitler made a banger I’d still listen to it. I’m so glad you think the same!
Wow! I also just shovel whatever disgusting shit someone places in front of my face directly into my mouth without regard for what it is, where it came from, or how it tastes! It’s so awesome to finally meet another human being who just mindlessly consumes whatever stupid bullshit that gets thrown in front of him without thinking just like me! Man we are so much alike it’s scary.
Yeah I don’t think AI has intent yet.
Of course you should listen to whatever you like, that’s not in question. I like to hear the waves at the beach, thunder, rain. None are music but are lovely sounds.