Totally agree with you on the copyright aspect: that was not an area I touched upon in the post, so thank you very much for pointing it out, since other readers may certainly want to know. Yes I am on Spotify, but that's more because it seems like its the only viable way to even share my stuff with friends-and-family given how completely it's become the base mode of distribution! Certainly haven't seen a $ from it, nor will I ever.
In general, I actually thought the entirety of your comment was totally on point and I'm very glad you made it. Look I know I'm not "making music" in any sort of traditional manner and I know how it's perceived. But it is something I've been devoting more time to, and getting a lot of pleasure out of. Ultimately I want to pass the inside of my brain on to other humans, and feel like this is a process that might help me do that given the particular circumstances of my genetic lottery (that is, vs using my vocal chords to sing or my fingers to play a violin). But I know this whole endeavor sounds a bit fake/slop... still I'd rather not put up euphemistic descriptions of my "new band" on twitter/insta but rather call it what it is. After all "songxytr" is pronounced "songshitter."
And thanks for your handle... I had missed that. Given I was sitting in Goa *yesterday... EDM is very much the mood.
>> Man pushes slot machine lever 5,000x and edits together best slot machine sounds to make song. Proceeds to beat chest about being a music maker.
While you may have meant that as a criticism, I don't think that is an inaccurate description of the process and do hope my post describes it as such. Yes sampling from the latent-space is an exercise in curating and harnessing randomness.
>> ...the mental justifications in the blog post are painful. I think you may find musicians bristle at your claim that all art is circular,
Yes I many/most do. This is not a method of "making music" that could have been contemplated 5 years ago (harnessing randomness = learning an instrument for 10+ years = wtf!!!??). But it exists today, and there are a lot of folks like me who are enabled by it. There will be some among us (not me!) who come along who are far more talented, and when this tech is shown to enable their talent, then I think the bristling will lessen.
>> [various issues about copyright]
I write my own lyrics from my meat-brain, so I may own the copyright to the words (maybe?). But I've chosen to release the words out into the world with no expectation of keeping that. And yes I understand I do not own the copyright to the songs/music/etc (I have read Suno's rights and recent Udio/UMG deals etc). In any case, I don't much care about that, nor am I looking to make $$$ off this. I wrote (words) for a long time... and can now put them to music. If there are any others of you out there who would like to do that, I would suggest you try these paths as well.
Just try not to push the button 1x... do it 5,000x! It's the effort and vision that keeps you from "slop" - and maybe you'll be the one who'll make it great fucking art!
Well I do believe it is "music" but whether it's any "good" I guess idk! I do enjoy the process though and believe there would be others who would as well.
Love the passionate replies!
I think I especially agree with this comment:
>> think that soon, some very accomplished musicians will learn to leverage tools like Suno, but they aren't in the majority yet. We're still in the "vibe-coding" phase of AI music generation. We saw this happen with CG. When it started, engineers did most of the creating, and we got less-than-stellar results[0]. Then, CG became its own community and vocation, and true artists started to dominate.
Hey its likely not going to be me, but let's be real - any user of this technology who has gone beyond the "type in a prompt and look i got a silly song about poop" stage will probably agree - someone's going to produce some bangers using this tech. It's inevitable and if you don't think so it's likely you haven't done anything more than "low-effort" work on these platforms. "Low effort" work - which a majority of AI swill us - is going to suck, whether its AI or not.
And while I have the forum, I do want to make another point. I pay more for a month for Suno than Spotify ($25 vs $9). Suno/Udio etc: do what you need to to make sure the artists and catalogues are getting compensated... as an user I would pay even more knowing that was settled.
Tools like Suno are fundamentally enabling. I'm about 40 years old and never "had the music" - not for lack of trying (music lessons at a young age)... but could never carry a tune or keep rhythm. I suppose its what being dyslexic feels like. If I were educated in a culture where music was fundamentally as important as reading or math, I suppose would have spent enough hours on it to eventually be passable... but I got frustrated, the music lessons stopped. But that doesn't mean I stopped appreciating or wanting to make music!
And then comes Suno (and OpenAI's jukebox before that), and it felt like my brain exploded... like the classic scene in a superhero movie when the power was given to me. Is my music good? No - but I spent years writing and fashioning poetry and all of a sudden can put that to music... hard to explain how awesome that feels. and i love using the tools and it's getting better and it's been fundamentally empowering. I know it's easy to say generative art is generative swill... but "learning Suno" is no different than "learning guitar".
In general, I actually thought the entirety of your comment was totally on point and I'm very glad you made it. Look I know I'm not "making music" in any sort of traditional manner and I know how it's perceived. But it is something I've been devoting more time to, and getting a lot of pleasure out of. Ultimately I want to pass the inside of my brain on to other humans, and feel like this is a process that might help me do that given the particular circumstances of my genetic lottery (that is, vs using my vocal chords to sing or my fingers to play a violin). But I know this whole endeavor sounds a bit fake/slop... still I'd rather not put up euphemistic descriptions of my "new band" on twitter/insta but rather call it what it is. After all "songxytr" is pronounced "songshitter."
And thanks for your handle... I had missed that. Given I was sitting in Goa *yesterday... EDM is very much the mood.