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Here's a little thought experiment. Someone invents an AI that can create songs in the style of any band based on existing recordings as well as known market tr

Here's a little thought experiment. Someone invents an AI that can create songs in the style of any band based on existing recordings as well as known market trends at the time. And you want Led Zeppelin 1970, at the heart of the British blues/hard rock/psychedelic period, because Led Zeppelin 1978 doesn't sound that good owing to the creative core shifting away from Page and the general floundering of "Classic Rock" artists at that time amidst the punk/New Wave movements. So your AI whips up a fantastic Led Zep 1970 album. And it sounds almost nothing like Led Zeppelin III, which was actually released that year. How could it? The inputs were Led Zeppelin I (composed and recorded late 1968) and Led Zeppelin II (composed and recorded while on tour in 1969) not to mention the other trends taking place in the British music scene, from Hey Jude to War Pigs as well as American influences like Jimi Hendrix and CSNY. Led Zeppelin III came out of left field, from a desire of the band to switch things up and take a break from what they had been doing for the first two albums. They did a lot of writing and some recording at an isolated farmhouse in Wales. It's more acoustic, and it's quite wonderful. I don't think any AI could pull it off even with some setting like "skew acoustic" because little of that existed in the band's earlier output, Page's Yardbirds work, or even the mid-60s studio musician sessions completed by Jones and Page in London. What the "Led Zeppelin 1970" AI would turn out is something more akin to the hard rock/psychedelic sound of the first 2 albums and reworkings of obscure American Delta blues songs. Would it be fun to listen to? Maybe. But it wouldn't represent the creative evolution and experimentation of the band, which comes about from 4 very talented people (and sometimes other out-of-sight creative forces) working together and sometimes making unpredictable discoveries, mistakes, and wrong turns.

noduerme 4y ago
>>Would it be fun to listen to? Maybe. But it wouldn't represent the creative evolution and experimentation of the band So.. I agree 100% but this is totally 1990s thinking. This is dinosaur stuff. The entire concept of authenticity has been deleted. Not authenticity itself. The concept of it as an important thing has been deleted. That is definitely no longer a valid defense of anything. That's what we believed in in the 90s. Human architecture, human flaws, mistakes, dwellings, ideas. Shit, it's the basis of western civilization. That's gone, my friend. When someone resurrects Led Zeppelin, it will be so promoted and splashed around that kids who never heard of them will think it's the coolest new band ever. The songs and avatars will be cartoons. The music - it won't even matter if it's stolen or not. No one will have heard it before so it'll sound amazing and original. This is the depressing thing about the music industry, and it's been this way for 20 years now. Pure manipulation of 99% of people. And the 1% who go find local bands, and go to shows, are locked indoors. Hoping and praying that some generation will show up who hate corporate rock and love underground punk / hip hop bands ... that's been a losing fight for a long time. But what we do have is a system that finds any band with 3000+ fans and co-opts it. Creative humans have almost no reach anymore outside old folks facebook networks.
- potta_coffee 4y ago
  Your take is extremely cynical. I'm also cynical about pop-culture, corporate / media driven culture, what-have-you. But what I've done is just started ignoring it entirely. On the rare occasion I'm exposed to current music / movies, I don't even recognize the current "stars" anymore. There is so much good music out there being put out by random individuals with a laptop and a guitar.

noduerme 4y ago

>>Would it be fun to listen to? Maybe. But it wouldn't represent the creative evolution and experimentation of the band So.. I agree 100% but this is totally 1990s thinking. This is dinosaur stuff. The entire concept of authenticity has been deleted. Not authenticity itself. The concept of it as an important thing has been deleted. That is definitely no longer a valid defense of anything. That's what we believed in in the 90s. Human architecture, human flaws, mistakes, dwellings, ideas. Shit, it's the basis of western civilization. That's gone, my friend. When someone resurrects Led Zeppelin, it will be so promoted and splashed around that kids who never heard of them will think it's the coolest new band ever. The songs and avatars will be cartoons. The music - it won't even matter if it's stolen or not. No one will have heard it before so it'll sound amazing and original. This is the depressing thing about the music industry, and it's been this way for 20 years now. Pure manipulation of 99% of people. And the 1% who go find local bands, and go to shows, are locked indoors. Hoping and praying that some generation will show up who hate corporate rock and love underground punk / hip hop bands ... that's been a losing fight for a long time. But what we do have is a system that finds any band with 3000+ fans and co-opts it. Creative humans have almost no reach anymore outside old folks facebook networks.

potta_coffee 4y ago
Your take is extremely cynical. I'm also cynical about pop-culture, corporate / media driven culture, what-have-you. But what I've done is just started ignoring it entirely. On the rare occasion I'm exposed to current music / movies, I don't even recognize the current "stars" anymore. There is so much good music out there being put out by random individuals with a laptop and a guitar.