[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Apparently a security guard tried to stop Killer Mike from entering the Grammies arena, KM went past him, the guard

Quote

chas[ed] him down after the fact -- something TMZ got video of

Killer Mike Addresses Grammys Arrest, Confusion & Overzealous Guard (tmz.com)

then placed him under citizen's arrest and called the real cops, alleging KM assaulted him (possibly brushed past him or pushed him? hmm, wonder if that guard is hoping for a massive bribe to drop the charges...). But KM was still allowed to accept his Grammy awards before being hauled off in handcuffs. Didn't realize that KM is apparently also a big 'Back the Blue' (police) supporter and has family members who are cops. (Well, if he did shove the security guard, then he was pretty much acting like a cop....)

Quote

Two different events happened simultaneously last night in the Crypto.com Arena [...] a venue fittingly named after a postmodern financial shell game. [...] Meanwhile, Taylor Swift seemed to think she was at a shareholders' meeting to announce her second-quarter profit projections, or, as she called it, her new album. And while there, she might as well collect her annual bonus payment, or, as the Grammys call it, the prize for Album of the Year[...] to become the artist with the most wins in that category.

[... Olivia Rodrigo's] performance [...] built to a climax of thick red blood dripping from the very walls and ceiling of the set right onto Rodrigo's face, Carrie-style[...]

[...] the real honor to O'Connor's rebel spirit came at the end, when Lennox became the first artist to say anything of real social significance onstage, raising a fist and proclaiming, "Artists for a cease-fire! Peace in the world!"

The relative mutedness among nearly everyone else was shockingly uniform, given world events and the upcoming American elections. [...]

The members of Boygenius, at least, did wear red Artists for Ceasefire pins on their white suits [...] One wonders why Boygenius apparently wasn't asked to perform, and whether it had anything to do with fears of what the forthright trio might say in the live broadcast.

[...] Swift [...] used the moment to announce [...] she would be releasing a previously unhinted-at new album, The Tortured Poets Department.

Grammys 2024: Taylor Swift made history—and one big mistake. (slate.com)

Now she's going to start torturing poets? Maybe record their screams, and the sounds of beating and cutting flesh and breaking bones et cetera, and put that out as an album? She's getting worse and worse....

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 06 February 2024 - 03:36 PM

[JPK]

I'm super excited because my current musical obsession, Bear Ghost, is going on their first ever tour and they announced an extra date in my home city. Can't say they picked my favorite venue, but I'll take what I can get, I guess.

https://youtu.be/0RV...b-SlMnYVv6zNr6p

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

Here's something I curated heavily from Suno v3 over the last 2 days. I'm kinda scared at how "emotional" the vocal performances are getting.

Spoiler

Took me hundreds of prompts to find a seed idea that I reaaaally liked. Then a further few hundred to generate enough meat and variations to make a full track - which I then stitched together like frankenstein in Cubase.

My whole perspective on this flipped a few days ago, it went from being just a funny gag to all of a sudden making me question everything. I'm being moved emotionally by AI vocals and melodies. Where on earth does this lead!

VI-CONTROL

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 10 March 2024 - 03:04 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Suno AI does "electropop metalcore rap" (raw AI outputs):

The Invasion v3 | Suno

A bit more pop:

The Invasion v2 | Suno

A bit more death metal-y:

The Invasion v11 | Suno

A bit more rap:

The Invasion v17 | Suno

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

This was created by Rolling Stone magazine with a few prompts into Suno [AI]. And this is early stages...

AI - Next steps we can take | Page 6 | VI-CONTROL

Soul Of The Machine by Rolling Stone (soundcloud.com)

AI sings the blues....

Quote

Markrs That is ridiculous, if you had asked me I wouldn't have spotted that was AI [...]

jehovahlicious This is FN depressing.

AI - Next steps we can take | Page 6 | VI-CONTROL

Well it's the blues....

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 18 March 2024 - 02:52 PM

[Gorefest]

What are you trying to prove, exactly? That AI can compete with human music? I imagine you have never been to a live concert? Everyone can make stuff that sounds a bit like other stuff. That doesn't make it worthwhile to listen to.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Gorefest, on 18 March 2024 - 06:06 PM, said:

What are you trying to prove, exactly? That AI can compete with human music? I imagine you have never been to a live concert? Everyone can make stuff that sounds a bit like other stuff. That doesn't make it worthwhile to listen to.

lol

I'm a vocalist and instrumentalist. I've given many live concerts (pre-covid), and of course been to many more (though if what you really want is the best musical quality and listening experience they're a waste of time IMO, and worse than that now given the ongoing pandemic that has afflicted a large percentage of people in the US (6.8% by the CDC's latest estimate) and the UK with long covid.) I typically spend three to five hours a day practicing or recording music or doing music production.

Sounding very emotional (on vocals or Seaboard) is one of my specialties, and I'm pleasantly surprised that AI has gotten so good at it. What really matters in the long run is progress.

The music it's producing now is actually pretty good, though bound to traditional genres or mash-ups of traditional genres (like those "electropop metalcore rap" exemplars...). I've been listening to it for pleasure, and I've been experimenting with gradually morphing my voice into various AI voices (and genders) and back again (and oscillating). Suno AI has immense potential for generating "original" instrumental loops, one-shot samples, and catchy pop melodies (I already generated one that's been stuck in my head, though I'd change it a bit before using it). It is the music of the march of progress.

A happy side effect, at least in the short term, will hopefully be a transition towards greater originality in human-produced music (and art more generally)---towards what current artificial neural network technologies would (probably) be effectively unable to emulate because of a lack of training examples. But Progress will progress....

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 18 March 2024 - 06:28 PM

[JPK]

Gorefest, on 18 March 2024 - 06:06 PM, said:

What are you trying to prove, exactly? That AI can compete with human music? I imagine you have never been to a live concert? Everyone can make stuff that sounds a bit like other stuff. That doesn't make it worthwhile to listen to.

Azath is just on a one-bot mission to convince all of us humans that all media is better with AI assistance.

Why should anyone bother releasing a mediocre song of their own making when they can run it through an AI assist and have Chat write the lyrics and composition and replace your voice with Freddie Mercury featuring Prince on guitar?

This post has been edited by JPK: 18 March 2024 - 08:38 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

JPK, on 18 March 2024 - 08:38 PM, said:

Why should anyone bother releasing a mediocre song of their own making when they can run it through an AI assist and have Chat write the lyrics and composition and replace your voice with Freddie Mercury featuring Prince on guitar?

... especially if your name's Matt Berninger.

As for Prince---I've actually been practicing parts of this recently (same virtual instrument and virtual amp settings as in the video, from his Patreon):



... but I'm absolutely fine with AI being able to do better imitations of what's already been done. I want to take it beyond that. (And improvise live duets with AI, on my way to actually becoming a cyborg... bring on the brain implants so I can make "music for cyborgs", Singularities, and the event horizons of futurity!)

[Tsundoku]

Azath Vitr (D, on 18 March 2024 - 09:19 PM, said:

"music for cyborgs", Singularities, and the event horizons of futurity

The new album out now from AVD! Download, stream or plug it straight into your gooey grey matter.

This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 19 March 2024 - 06:33 AM

[Gorefest]

Don't get.me wrong, I do not oppose using AI in art and music. If the tools are there, people will use them, and hopefully creative people will use them creatively. They said the same thing when electric organs got introduced into music and using those has produced some of the most amazing songs out there. It is when you take out all elements of human participation and interaction that I personally just don't see the point anymore. If it is to be art, there should be an element of human thought and inspiration behind it. Otherwise why even bother?

This post has been edited by Gorefest: 19 March 2024 - 08:53 AM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Gorefest, on 19 March 2024 - 08:52 AM, said:

Don't get.me wrong, I do not oppose using AI in art and music. If the tools are there, people will use them, and hopefully creative people will use them creatively. They said the same thing when electric organs got introduced into music and using those has produced some of the most amazing songs out there. It is when you take out all elements of human participation and interaction that I personally just don't see the point anymore. If it is to be art, there should be an element of human thought and inspiration behind it. Otherwise why even bother?

All the examples I've posted recently had lyrics written by humans. The first example (as explained) was put together from different AI generated parts... by a human.

Generative AI is tapping our collective unconscious and experimenting with motion and randomness throughout the latent space generated thereby---guided by human (sometimes all too human) prompts.

Otherwise why bother? Because it's beautiful, interesting, and emotional---with the emotion derived not just from one individual human, but from the space of possibility generated by the conventional expressive forms of popular recorded music up to now.

On that note, one of my favorite innovative synth developers wrote something interesting:

Quote

music research also has revealed that there is a deep intrinsic link between timbre and the temperament / scale you use. As a consequence: if we constrain ourselves to equal temperament we automatically constrain ourselves in the timbre-space. Or in other words: there are no more new timbres in equal-temperament world. The new and exciting timbres are waiting in non-equal temperament space.

Spoiler

... You cannot simply alter the scale and use instruments/timbres that had been designed for 12-tone-equal-temperament, or at least this will give very limited results. What we need are instruments that really take these facts into account. I started doing so in my "research lab" and while not everything is perfect I can at least say: these new instruments open new worlds of timbres and even more important: of emotional expression. You get melodies and chord progressions that sound unlike anything you heard before and they express emotions that have not been expressed before with music.

... I will post sound examples as soon as I start working on an instrument ... As one never gets a second chance to make a first impression I want these examples to perfectly demonstrate the new and exciting capabilities.

Discord

Here's a preview of their upcoming synth, Myth (release date now set for 4/20):

Quote

Virtual Analog Modeling has become the industry standard - for example VA filters and OSCs just sound more interesting than their plain digital counterparts. The reason is that digital filters are linear, while analog filters are non-linear . And our ears are just so sensitive to this difference!

But what would happen if you create an entire sound engine with non-linear processing? What if you could cover the sonic breadth of FM, physical modelling, wavetables, analog … with a single approach and just by tweaking a few knobs?

Flagship synth plugin - Dawesome (dawesomemusic.com)

[Gorefest]

Fair do, I will add a contribution as well in that case. An AI-generated (though human-directed/edited) official music video for a song by my favourite band:

https://youtu.be/sKN...NND88VgQJcRA7xH

(I never know how to include youtube links properly on this forum...)

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

Everyone from Beyoncé to Post Malone to Lana Del Rey seems to be "going country." Why now?

[...] ongoing trend being driven by Gen Z and millennials, and not just domestically but internationally[...] "Something in the Orange," [...] became the longest-charting country song by a male artist ever, even though it never rose above No. 10.

[...] Ed Sheeran has mused about making such a transition, and ex–One Direction star Zayn Malik [...] [At last it will be ART!]

country is[...] benefiting from a dearth of innovative energy in the rest of pop. [...] Aside from Olivia Rodrigo, it's hard to name an incandescent newcomer all eyes are following. [...] What else are they to do, turn to A.I.?

[...] that might be a final key

Spoiler

[...] At a time when people feel so terminally tethered to our devices, country foregrounds the offline, sometimes even off-grid life. Of course, it's not actually more "authentic" than any other commercial music—it's created with equal calculation and deliberation, maybe more so given Music Row's weakness for hierarchical groupthink. [...] You might listen to it on your phone, but it doesn't tend to sound as if it was made on one. (Though Morgan Wallen kinda does.) [...]

[...] The only safe bet is that whenever Taylor Swift finally makes her own country comeback, then for sure it's over.

... and the orange is... Trump?...

Quote

These things eat your bones and drive your minds crazy
But when you place your head between my spiked collar and jaw
I don't know much but there's no weight of gilded burning shit at all

[...] I poisoned myself again [...]

The orange touches all things around
The grass, trees and dew, how I just hate you
Time to drill for more oil for the anointed inferno

Zach Bryan – Something in the Orange (Z&E's Version) Lyrics | Genius Lyrics

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 28 March 2024 - 04:14 PM

[Gorefest]

Brrrr, country 🤢

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Gorefest, on 28 March 2024 - 05:50 PM, said:

Brrrr, country 🤢

Just wait until De Staat come out with their country album featuring Ed Sheeran's dulcet twangy falsetto... no doubt Hegel would be proud. ("Running backwards into the future / Don’t think you’re having a say-so [...] No everything’s a matter of time" indeed....)

[haiduk]

death/thrash/black metal

[Tsundoku]

Different.

Swedish Maidens Choir sings in Elvish:

https://www.goodnews...t-of-lotr-fans/

(A few dudes in there as well. False advertising! )

Here is their website, but it's all in Swedish:

https://eldandilifantasy.com/

This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 06 April 2024 - 03:52 AM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

After a 2023 that found rap off its game on the charts, in 2024 hip-hop is staging a Hot 100 comeback via the diss record. In a historic first, two rap beefs hit No. 1 on the big pop chart just in the past two months [...] America's new No. 1 song takes lethal lyrical aim at two of rap's kings, and there's evidence the millions who streamed it last week were mostly poring over [Kendrick] Lamar's withering one-minute verse [...] eviscerating the man born Aubrey Graham as well as veteran rapper's rapper J. Cole. The trouble started last fall when Drake [Aubrey] dropped [...] "First Person Shooter," [...]

with the track currently unshareable on TikTok, thanks to Universal Music's ongoing boycott of the micro-video platform, the blowup of "Like That" was about as old-school as they come: focused on the song, not a meme.

[...] The song is built entirely around a sped-up sample of [...] "Everlasting Bass," a 1988 synths-and-scratching classic that's been sampled dozens of times by everyone from Lil Wayne to Three 6 Mafia.

Future, Metro Boomin, and Kendrick Lamar at No. 1: How "Like That" became the second of two diss tracks to hit the top of the charts this year. (slate.com)

Ah, the Pulitzer winner. Surely he will give those kayfabe poseurs an eloquent and impassioned lecture on not glorifying gun violence when it's an epidemic killing Black Americans in large numbers, right?

Quote

Pussy niggas told, ain't gon' wake up out they sleep
You can't hear that switch, but you can hear them niggas scream

[...] Twenty-carat ring, I put my fingers down her throat (Uh, uh, uh)
If I lose a carat, she might choke (Uh, uh, uh)
I know she gon' swallow, she a G.O.A.T. [...]
Got the shooters in the corner like the pack in

Apparently a "switch" turns a handgun into a "fully automatic" weapon (well, not in the AI sense... for better or worse). That line about losing a diamond down her throat is a strikingly poetic image. However, that's actually Future's verse, not Kendrick Lamar's. Surely he will set Future straight:

Quote

I'm way too paranoid for a threat [so far, so... good? ...]
Ah, my temperament bipolar, I choose violence ["I am large, I contain multitudinous legions"---of violence]
Okay, let's get it up, it's time for him to prove that he's a problem
Niggas clickin' up, but cannot be legit [... nice pun on the "clicking" of empty (or not?) guns and "cliquing"?]
first-person shooter, I hope they came with three switches
Got 2TEEZ with me, I'm snatchin' chains and burnin' tattoos, it's up [burning tattoos---like with lighters? flamethrowers? maybe pour gasoline all over then use the lighter?... ]
Lost too many soldiers not to play it safe [by snatching chains and burning---presumably other peoples'---tattoos?]
[...] Think I won't drop the location? I still got PTSD [...]
'Fore all your dogs gettin' buried
That's a K with all these nines, he gon' see Pet Sematary
Nigga, bum

Huh, I'd assume "drop the location" means disclose his current location so they can have a shoot-out. But then he says he still has PTSD... ah what complexity. That must mean he's "bipolar" after all. Give that man another Pulitzer!

As explained on Genius lyrics:

Quote

2TEEZ is the Director of Security at Kendrick's former record label Top Dawg Entertainment and a close friend of Lamar in general. Kendrick insists on having a bodyguard when making threats, as he's seen many of his more reckless peers die without one. [...] [Lamar] compares his ammo to that of a "K," or an AK-47, which is a much more high-powered weapon than the "9" that Drake and Cole have, which is most likely a 9mm pistol

Future, Metro Boomin & Kendrick Lamar – Like That Lyrics | Genius Lyrics

[worry]

Okay grandpa.