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points by zahlman 4 days ago | 0 comments
What claims about musicians? The only claim I saw is that it's relatively rare to observe musicians doing the musician thing, and I think that's quite accurate because IMX musicians (in the sense that we mean for the current purposes) are rare individuals.
[–] foltik 4 days ago
> In real life, it very rarely happens that somebody will spend a lifetime learning, gather a band, and then record something extremely off-beat. Because there are risks to that. Destroying your image, having to find people that are on the same wavelength, having to justify the time and money it costs to record something weird and not marketable.

> Sure, people make weird stuff once in a while, but very rarely, [...] and even then they tend to pick something relatively tame and marketable and stick to that.

> But AI can bypass all that, and that makes things interesting.

> Very few people genuinely "love music" in the way that you have in mind.

Those claims. They clearly come from a tech person’s surface level understanding of the music industry, which is a tiny fraction of all music and not representative of why people make it or what they enjoy. "Very few people genuinely love music" says it all. Have some self awareness. You're describing nothing but your own narrow perspective.

[–] stickfigure 3 days ago
Let me try to steelman the parent's argument.

There are a finite number of musicians in the world. Most of them are working on music that either 1) appeals to them, specifically, or 2) appeals to enough of an audience that they can eek out a living. And chances are, if you're hearing it in public, you're getting #2.

I want music that appeals to me. My tastes are broad but not infinite, and I've already thoroughly plumbed the depths of my favorite genres - many of which are largely ignored by modern musicians (see #2 above). AI offers a way of getting new music for neglected or underdeveloped genres. Spanish language 80s new wave combined with reggae? Why not?

I listen to a lot of music across many disparate genres. I even play music (for fun). I have also enjoyed some AI generated music. It's not either/or, I can listen to both.

[–] foltik 3 days ago
Absolutely, it’s fine to enjoy it. And random hyper specific mashups are fun.

But as we’ve seen with AI writing and AI art, the novelty wears off quickly. It’s dazzling at first, but once you start to hear more and more of it and pay closer attention to the finer details, it becomes more evident how samey and blurry and soulless it all is.

Real niche music is out there, and it’ll be more interesting and rewarding to find (or even create!) than any AI music could be.

[–] zahlman 3 days ago
No, it has nothing to do with the music industry. If it were false that very few people genuinely love music in the way that leads to "spending a lifetime learning, gathering a band and then recording something extremely off-beat" then by now I would have met some people who did that. And it would be easier to find people who primarily listen to stuff that isn't mass-produced.
[–] foltik 3 days ago
Have you considered that you might just not be around those people? In my experience (in a large metropolitan area) they're abundant, which would seem to carry more weight than you not having met any yet.