I Made Music With AI. I Don’t Feel Guilty About It.

Musicians have always used technology to make sounds they couldn’t make alone. AI just makes us more uncomfortable.

The pushback against AI music is loud. Very loud.

I can hear why.

Some of it sounds bland. And there’s a good reason for that — because it’s an average of other music and sounds it’s been trained on. Same with AI writing. Most of us can easily spot the red flags now.

And big tech companies are leading campaigns to combat AI image slop.

Full disclosure: I use AI tools.

I use AI for research, and sometimes for help cleaning up my copy. But I write what I write first, and use AI to clean up mistakes.

But because so many people let AI completely write for them, there’s backlash against it. We even make fun of it.

But the pushback on AI music is even more pronounced. The prime target is Suno, though there are plenty of other AI music sites. So naturally, I had to try it out.

More on that in a bit.

Spotify has noticed the pushback. The company announced that beginning in mid-September, it will start labeling artist profiles whose identities appear to be AI-generated.

“Listeners have been clear in telling us that they don’t like seeing an artist profile that seems human, only to find out that the persona is AI-generated,” Spotify said in announcing the change.

Those profiles will get an “AI Persona” badge. By default, Spotify also won’t put music from AI Personas into its editorial or algorithmic recommendations.

And yes, there are plenty of people using Suno to create music out of whole cloth, letting the AI create the song structure, the composition, the lyrics, the whole thing. And it’s become obvious when they have.

But there are others — actual musicians — who use Suno as another tool.

Back in the pandemic days, I added to my guitar collection, learned how to use GarageBand and Logic Pro, and wrote and recorded some of my own music.

I discovered I could upload that music to Suno. I was curious to see what it would do with it.

I’d long harbored a dream that, one day, I could convince some good musicians, a good band, with a good producer, in a professional setting, to take my music “demos” and cover them.

But then I heard about Suno AI and that it could do that.

And that’s what I did. I have to say, most of the time I was impressed.

Here are some results:

Then I had it turn some of my poetry into musical pieces, but I wrote long, detailed prompTs about atmosphere, song structure, tone, modes, and chord progressions.

Again, I was impressed.

My point is that while I used Suno to create music, it started with my music, my ideas, my composition, notes and chords and words I came up with. Out of my head and into the machine.

And I know that you might be saying, “But Rob, real live musicians could have done cover versions of your music, and you could have paid them.”

I hear you. But two things. Thing one, that depended on me finding some musicians who’d want to do that for me — I tried. And thing two, right now it’s money I do not have.

And then you might say, “You still shouldn’t have used soulless AI.”

But here’s where it gets interesting.

When I was recording my original songs myself in GarageBand and Logic Pro, I made use of technology to play instruments I didn’t own or couldn’t play myself.

I could write a violin line, play it on my guitar, and have a virtual instrument turn it into violins. I can’t play the violin. I don’t own one.

And drums? I can’t play drums. So I took advantage of the technology that was there to create drum tracks.

Isn’t that at least a cousin of what we’re doing with AI? Isn’t technology already being used in professional studios to let musicians create things they couldn’t physically perform themselves?

There are some legitimate concerns about Suno and AI music. A major one is copyrights. Some musicians whose creations were used to train music AIs say they should be paid for the use of their music. That’s legitimate.

The other complaint is that AI music is no good because it’s only “scraped” music from other sources.

But… don’t human musicians do something similar?

For example, my influences are Yes, Genesis, King Crimson and Steven Wilson. You could go through some songs I’ve recorded and perhaps compliment me on using those influences. You could pick out a bit and say, “I see you’re channeling some Fripp with that line.”

But if I were an AI, you might cry, “Theft! No fair! Not real!”

The difference is, of course, that I’m a real human. At least, I think I am. I’m told that thinking I exist is the criterion.

Is AI the devil? Will it put real writers and musicians out of work? Most likely, yes. And already, in many cases.

But putting writers and musicians out of work isn’t necessarily the same thing as putting an end to human creativity.

Companies will — and do — use AI to save money. If they can generate a piece of music instead of hiring a composer, or generate copy instead of paying a writer, some of them will. And do.

But people didn’t start writing songs because somebody invented the recording contract. We didn’t start telling stories because somebody invented the publishing industry. We were doing those things long before anyone figured out how to make money from them. We were dancing around in caves miming the story of how we killed that leopard. And then someone had a bright idea of drawing pictures of it on the cave wall.

AI may change who gets paid to create. It may change what those jobs look like. It may eliminate some of them.

But I don’t think it eliminates the human need to make something. It won’t stop humans from creating.

Such is the danger of technological advancement. Talkies and recorded sound helped put theater musicians out of work. Automation eliminated factory jobs. Computers wiped out entire categories of work.

But careers change. New careers are created. And no, that kind of change doesn’t come without pain. Look at the Industrial Revolution.

We don’t know yet what the result of our AI-ification will be. Perhaps whole new industries will develop, new types of careers.

And yeah, there’s a possibility that AI will take over the world.

But if it did, would it do any worse than we have?