About half a year ago I started up a discussion called How far off is AI created music?
Well, apparently it wasn't far off at all... arguably it was already happening, but now it's newsworthy.
Just look at the viral release of "Heart on My Sleeve", a track dropped by the anonymous ghostwriter977 that uses AI-generated vocals to mimic Drake and The Weekend, and the subsequent action by Drake and The Weekend's record label UMG to order the song taken down from platforms like TikTok, Spotify, YouTube, SoundCloud, and others. There's a good breakdown of the situation in @scofieldidehen's recent post AI in Music: The Future of Music.
So, I'm curious what y'all think about all this... do you see AI-generated music that mimics an artist's voice, writing style, and instrumentation as morally wrong? Or, on the other hand, do you know of anybody out there who is using AI to generate original music rather than trying to closely mimic existing music? What other thoughts do you have on all this?
Top comments (12)
shouts from rooftop HOLLY HERNDON!
Holly has been working with AI and algorithmic programming in her music since 2018. Her album PROTO, which came out in 2019, deals with themes of technology and sentience in both its lyrics and in its construction. It was one of my favorite releases of that year.
If you listen to any track from the record, listen to "Frontier," in which a chorus of human and programmed voices sing a hopeful yet cautionary Sacred Harp hymn about the climate crisis.
And, since "Frontier" doesn't have a music video, here's the video (also AI-assisted, of course) for "Eternal."
Holly participated as a guest in a really interesting conversation on Vox's Today, Explained podcast last week about "Fake Drake" and applications for AI in music creation. I highly recommend checking it out if this topic interests you!
Wow! This is exactly what I'm looking for. Holly sounds seriously awesome and I'm super interested in the themes covered in her music. I really dug "Eternal" and will def be checking out more of her stuff! Gonna pop on "Frontier" in just a wee bit. Thanks for this! 🙌
So cool YES thank you for sharing
Yay. More pointless music at an even faster pace. I really hope this will spark a new interest in actual live shows with all their flaws and unpredictability which make them exciting.
Haha! I very much hear ya.
The music industry was already pretty darn
good atbad about using the same old formula to manufacture hits for folks again and again... this feels like it'll make it even easier for them to do that.Just imagine a future where we listen to AI regurgitate pop stars' voices that sing lyrics based on whatever the algorithm thinks our preferences are on top of beats that have been designed based on our listening history... uhhh no thanks!
I agree with ya that hopefully all this will pique interest in live shows and human music. Everything happens in waves, so if AI-created music enters the mainstream, I'd expect something human to rise up against it — I sincerely hope so!
On that note, this convo reminds me a little bit of this post:
This is the time to be unpredictable and human
Christian Heilmann ・ Mar 28 ・ 5 min read
I can see this method used as a tool for songwriters when creating demos to send to other artists. Also, it's important to emphasize that the songwriter created the lyrics and the vocals themselves and AI just turned their voice into Drake's and The Weekend's. This hat creating music still needs skilled humans.
Oh totally, Christine! I can see that happening too.
And actually, you mentioning that AI still needs skilled human musicians kinda reminds me of a previous instance where AI and human (James Murphy) collaborated on a musical composition that was created with lots and lots of tennis data. Sounds weird? It is, haha! Let me explain... 🎾
James Murphy (singer/producer/bandleader of LCD Soundsystem) and IBM developers partnered to create music from a bunch of data that was gathered from tennis matches at the 2014 US Open. My understanding is that the data produced a bunch of bleeps and bloops based on parameters that James Murphy set and then he curated & organized them afterward into song (this is the bit that I think connects with what you're talking about). Here's a video (and an article on Pitchfork) that explains what's happening better than I have.
So yeah, that may or may not have helped. 😅
Regardless of how it's made though, I actually quite like the resulting music, particularly this one:
I'm a big fan of the YouTube channel Digging The Greats and just the other day they released a new episode called What the AI Drake Song Means for Music... this video def got my wheels turning about what's possible with AI-generated music and some of the potential legal implications as well. It doesn't dig into the tech as much as it gets into copyright, the legal workarounds that cover/parody songs may provide AI, and a bunch of speculation about what's to come. Hope y'all enjoy!
You can do it now! Download Sonic Pi [sonic-pi.net/] and then ask chatgpt to make songs for you that mimics top artists.
Wow! That is wild. Thanks for sharing, Philip!
you inspired me to write something even longer!
dev.to/philipjohnbasile/crafting-s...
Cool!