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The thing is, we have been here before. Think back to the mid-1980s and the first time everyone got their hands on a Casio or Yamaha keyboard with auto-accompa

The thing is, we have been here before. Think back to the mid-1980s and the first time everyone got their hands on a Casio or Yamaha keyboard with auto-accompaniment. It was a huge amount of fun to play with, just pressing a few buttons, playing a few notes and feeling like you were producing a "real" pop song. Meanwhile, any actual musicians were to be found crying in the corner of the room, not because a new tool had come along which threatened their position, but because non-musicians apparently didn't understand (at least immediately) the difference between these superficial, low-effort machine-generated sounds and actual music.

HPsquared 2y ago
That's a really good analogy.
sirsinsalot 2y ago
And yet Clint Eastwood by the Gorillaz was a Casio demo track. It isn't so black and white. https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ
- lugu 2y ago
  That is to the point. Gorillaz has talent, and that is what made Clint Eastwood a hit. Not the Yamaha.
- _emacsomancer_ 2y ago
  Similarly, Under Mi Sleng Teng[1], but here too it required human musical talent. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleng_Teng https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleng_Teng
- jazzypants 2y ago
  To be clear, Dan the Automator added an additional drum track, an additional bass track, and a melodica track as well as numerous other sound effects. They didn't just loop the Casio demo track.
Workaccount2 2y ago
What is scary about AI is the speed of improvement, not what it currently is. People keep forming these analogies/explanations with the inherent premise that what we have now is what AI is going to be - "It's actually kind of shitty so don't fret, not much will change". AI music creation has improved more in the last 5 years than keyboard accompaniment improved in the previous 40 years. It would be very brazen to bet that the tech 5 years from now is hardly any better. Especially when scaling transformers has consistently improved outputs. Double especially when the entire tech industry is throwing the house at scaling it.
- agentultra 2y ago
  ... and it still won't be music. The reason why people like music is because another person wrote and performed it. We like watching other people. Give us an infinite playlist of elevator music and it just becomes oatmeal.
  - Workaccount2 2y ago
    This is just a "no true Scotsman" take. Popular music has already been synthetic and souless for decades now. People will listen to what sounds good to them, and we already know the bar is very low, and that the hard truth is that it is all subjective anyway.
    - jazzypants 2y ago
      Sure, bars and restaurants will have an endless supply of boring music, but no one is ever going to go to an AI music event.
      - Workaccount2 2y ago
        Read it and weep: https://www.nydailynews.com/2016/05/29/thousands-of-new-yorkers-came-out-to-see-japanese-pop-star-hatsune-miku-an-anime-hologram-that-sold-out-twice-in-the-same-night/ https://www.nydailynews.com/2016/05/29/thousands-of-new-york...

HPsquared 2y ago

That's a really good analogy.

sirsinsalot 2y ago

And yet Clint Eastwood by the Gorillaz was a Casio demo track. It isn't so black and white. https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ https://youtube.com/shorts/Wn0NtSNeQEQ

lugu 2y ago
That is to the point. Gorillaz has talent, and that is what made Clint Eastwood a hit. Not the Yamaha.
_emacsomancer_ 2y ago
Similarly, Under Mi Sleng Teng[1], but here too it required human musical talent. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleng_Teng https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleng_Teng
jazzypants 2y ago
To be clear, Dan the Automator added an additional drum track, an additional bass track, and a melodica track as well as numerous other sound effects. They didn't just loop the Casio demo track.

Workaccount2 2y ago

What is scary about AI is the speed of improvement, not what it currently is. People keep forming these analogies/explanations with the inherent premise that what we have now is what AI is going to be - "It's actually kind of shitty so don't fret, not much will change". AI music creation has improved more in the last 5 years than keyboard accompaniment improved in the previous 40 years. It would be very brazen to bet that the tech 5 years from now is hardly any better. Especially when scaling transformers has consistently improved outputs. Double especially when the entire tech industry is throwing the house at scaling it.

agentultra 2y ago
... and it still won't be music. The reason why people like music is because another person wrote and performed it. We like watching other people. Give us an infinite playlist of elevator music and it just becomes oatmeal.
- Workaccount2 2y ago
  This is just a "no true Scotsman" take. Popular music has already been synthetic and souless for decades now. People will listen to what sounds good to them, and we already know the bar is very low, and that the hard truth is that it is all subjective anyway.
  - jazzypants 2y ago
    Sure, bars and restaurants will have an endless supply of boring music, but no one is ever going to go to an AI music event.
    - Workaccount2 2y ago
      Read it and weep: https://www.nydailynews.com/2016/05/29/thousands-of-new-yorkers-came-out-to-see-japanese-pop-star-hatsune-miku-an-anime-hologram-that-sold-out-twice-in-the-same-night/ https://www.nydailynews.com/2016/05/29/thousands-of-new-york...