[injidup]

Last weekend a group of friends and I sat by the lake. One had a guitar, and we were all singing off-key to old classics and dancing to salsa and reggaeton. We were doing it together, and it was great. Much more fun than listening alone or caring about the authenticity of the music or not. It was the participation, not the product, that was the key.

Something went wrong with music and culture in recent times. Participation became consumption. Everybody got their own headphones, channels, and separate cultural bubbles. Concerts became about filming a DJ twiddling a USB controller.

By the lake we tried to get people up and dancing, and one of the girls led a reggaeton/zumba/salsa session. I had one woman come up and ask for advice on where to go to get dance lessons. But most people sat there watching, clearly wanting to take part but scared. People have learned that creativity and participation are not welcome.

The most amazing thing was a little 10-year-old girl who just sat herself down in our group of adults. She was so happy to see people singing and dancing. We chatted to her for a while, and then it turned out she could play guitar, so we gave her one and she jammed along. Her mother was observing from a distance and was happy to see her daughter connecting and participating with strangers.

I don't think the issue is between AI and authentic music. This argument about authenticity in music is ages old. It's more about the imbalance in participation between producer and consumer. If AI music allows someone with less formal musical skills to feel like they are joining in and making something, then maybe it has its value.

Still, I'll always be more impressed watching someone play their trained fingers over a piano or guitar. There is more magic in that than prompting an AI. But if the music is just a backing track to some other participatory activity like dancing, then the equation is different again. I honestly couldn't tell — or maybe care — if many of the Bachata songs played at parties are fully or partially AI-generated. I suspect a lot are. But most of the reason I'm there is not to fetishize the authenticity of music, but to hang out with friends and dance and have a good time.

[codeflo]

> If AI music allows someone with less formal musical skills to feel like they are joining in and making something, then maybe it has its value.

An emphatic no. What we need to do is to stop comparing every hobby performance, whether it's music or dancing, with the top 10 artists in their field. We need people to learn, and try, and feel safe to be visible and thus vulnerable in group situations without fear of being mocked on social media for eternity. To achieve this, we need to stop filming people, and we need a societal norm that treats a violation of this ban on par with spitting someone in the face. We need to celebrate amateurs that simply try to improve their raw, honest skills.

What we don't need to do is to give everybody a Fisher Price toy with a "make it sound awesome" button. We need human connections.

[hennell]

> What we need to do is to stop comparing every hobby performance, whether it's music or dancing, with the top 10 artists in their field.

I feel like one of the less discussed issues of the hyper-connected world is there are no small ponds to be the big fish in anymore. Used to be you could be the best in your school, church, town even city etc - even if you weren't that good. I remember being astounded as a kid by a woman who juggled 5 tennis balls in a local talent show. Now I can hop on youtube and watch people do way more impressive feats it doesn't seem so unique. I suspect that 5 ball routine might still be the greatest juggling I've seen in person, but it still doesn't compare to random acts I've seen online.

But especially with the para-social relationships of social media people feel connected even to big names now. You might not compare the local young singer to Taylor Swift, but people will to the tiktok singer they 'know' who liked their reply once.

It's gratifying and inspiring to be top of your class in something, but in a world where it's always a class of millions, you know you'll never reach the top.

[MisterTea]

This is why I don't consume feeds, have social media accounts and only use youtube to find specific things which is very rare for me. I maybe watch 10 videos on YT per month at most, these days mostly about machine shop and millwright operations.

Consuming all that content leaves you feeling small and isolated. The talents you thought you had are nothing in the face of a global pool of YT/TikTok/Insta superstars.

Currently, I share things with people I care about and who care about me. The rest of the world can remain ignorant of me and I of it. It's a good place to be.

[archagon]

What is "the top" anyway? See punk rock. You don't have to be the best performer, best singer, best songwriter, best anything to have an entire generation's eyes on you.

[microtonal]

I think it's part of the main character syndrome that social media invoked in most of us. Everybody wants to tell the story of their lives (but nobody really cares).

In the old days e.g. concerts were for enjoying the music together with people you did and didn't know. The best concerts were those where you were left sweaty from (slam)dancing with everyone in the pit on music that was even better-performed than on CD. Showing the experience afterwards was not really a thing that existed.

[cluckindan]

Thing is, if you are not a person who blends into the mass of ”normal”, you need to tell the story of your life. You already stick out like a sore thumb, and you need to explain to others why.

In other words, you need to be in control of your own narrative, or someone else will do it for you to fill the void. For example, someone can use cold reading to deduce what others suspect and fear and then paint you in that specific light, essentially planting individually targeted nasty rumours about you while increasing their rapport with others. That kind of rumours tend to spread.

Eventually you become the outcast in your social circles and you will be hard pressed to regain control of ”you” in the eyes of others.

[Silamoth]

I promise most people don’t care enough about you to spread rumors that paint you in a nasty light. If someone is doing that, you need to hang out with a new crowd and make some new friends. But most people have too much going on to care about you not being “normal”, if they even recognize your existence.

[lukan]

What? You absolutely don't need to tell the story of your life to be in control of it. Constantly worrying what other people will think of you, is how you loose control over your life, by not doing anymore the things you enjoy.

But yes, there are very confirmists circles and some will outcast you for not doing what everyone does - your choice for trying to still belong there or find a better group.

But if you really do what you want and you do it with confidence, you might find the conformists are suddenly coming back and think you are cool.

[kuerbel]

I can't play like Lang Lang. Only Lang Lang can play like Lang Lang. Just because some mfing AI can produce something that sounds like Lang Lang does not make it equal: resemblance is not identity.

If I see a performance from Lang Lang, I don't just perceive the sound, it is the expression of memory, discipline and attention. Learning an instrument is more than attaining the skill of producing the correct notes in the correct order. It shapes attention, perspective, patience, discipline, sensitivity and so much more. You can't replace that with effortless simulation. I mean you could, but it's practically meaningless.

[ben_w]

Sure, but because this argument works just as well whether "effortless simulation" means "GenAI" or "a recording", I don't know if you're objecting to one or the other or both.

[viccis]

Every talented pianist in a major conservatory can play like Lang Lang and are trying their best not to lmao

[kuerbel]

Haha, I get it. Just took him as an example because, in my experience, he is a famous pianist people recognise even if they don't listen to that kind of music. Maybe Vladimir Horowitz would be a better example.

[ChickeNES]

I think the average person has no idea who either of those people are. I think Liszt or Rachmaninov would be better reference points.

[cluckindan]

The average person sees a synthesizer keyboard and thinks ”piano”.

[tardedmeme]

https://xkcd.com/2501/

[FrontierProject]

As an average person, try Beethoven or Mozart.

[sevenzero]

>we need to stop filming people

As live music enjoyer and person that was commonly around safe spaces in the techno scene I cant agree more. Fuck filming people.

[kolektiv]

It's not even just music anymore. I love motor racing, but at the last meeting I went to, sat in the stands at an iconic first corner, tense with anticipation as the race started... Everyone around me sat there holding their phones up, filming it. I couldn't even see properly because of the forest of arms. People don't just... experience... something now.

What's even more ridiculous is that this wasn't a small race - it was filmed, and broadcast live. Their many, many camera angles and drone shots and everything else are superb, much better than your phone would be. It's on YouTube live and available years later. Why do this? It made me so sad.

[csomar]

They are going to the event in order to broadcast to their friends (or their profile feed) that they have gone to the events. Once I understood this, it made sense why filming is the most important thing for them in the event. They are not there for the race.

Glad I left social media (if you don't count HN). It'll be almost a decade soon since I deleted all my accounts.

[sevenzero]

Its mostly about sharing it with friends and social media. I dont know why these people feel the need to do this either. The healthiest thing I did last year was quitting all (common) social media platforms like Instagram, reddit and stuff like that. Life is much slower and I dont feel the need to check my phone every few minutes anymore (I barely posted anything anyway).

I guess people are addicted to new notifications. They are lonely and drawn to human interactions and attention through social media because they are incapable of getting it through real life.

[mcv]

I guess people want to prove they were authentically there, experiencing it themselves instead of watching it on TV. And I sort of get it. When I'm on vacation, I like making my own photos of everything, even if professional photographers have already made hundreds of far better photos of it. Somehow the ones I made mean more to me. And I don't even share those photos on social media.

So on the one hand making your own photos and movies at events is less authentic than just experiencing it, and yet at the same time more authentic than relying on professionals to film it for you.

[microtonal]

When I'm on vacation, I like making my own photos of everything, even if professional photographers have already made hundreds of far better photos of it.

I have found when looking a photos from 20 years ago, I skip most of the shots of only landscapes, buildings, etc. The only interesting shots are shots with the people that I travelled with in them. They bring back all the fond memories, the things we did together, etc.

So I now, when making pictures of sceneries try to do it as much with my fellow travelers in them.

As you say, others can make better pictures of the scenery.

[wiseowise]

And I can guarantee that most of them won't rewatch it.

[dlahoda]

Phoning like that damages their brains for sure.

Hope there will be research.

[gitgud]

> we need to stop filming people, and we need a societal norm that treats a violation of this ban on par with spitting someone in the face.

Agreed. Filming strangers in public is making everyone scared to have fun trying anything new, as they’re afraid of online mockery…

[fabianholzer]

> What we don't need to do is to give everybody a Fisher Price toy with a "make it sound awesome" button.

A sincere thank you for this metaphor.

[hununu]

This is really hard these days because up and coming artists can only do so nowadays via social media. In practical terms it means musicians if they want to succeed they need to be good at music AND self promotion through social media.

While theoretically access to everyone has been democratized when compared to music labels of the past since everyone can put their music on Spotify and social media, effectively that also means social media is now a required skill besides musicianship.

It's harder than ever to create your own thing and stay on track. I think this is why so many people are going bonkers with angine de poitrine for example.

[fullstop]

First of all, I 100% agree with you. With that in mind, do things like AutoTune now feel more like creative tools when compared to AI?

[footydude]

> But most people sat there watching, clearly wanting to take part but scared. People have learned that creativity and participation are not welcome.

In my experience, a decent proportion of people have always been nervous about joining in. I'd wager that for many of the onlookers it isn't driven by a creativity/participation thing, it's just a (pretty normal) fear of embarrassing themselves. Scroll back 30 years and I would undoubtedly be one of those awkward teenagers wanting to join in but scared to do so out of fear of embarrassing myself.

That said...There probably is a reasonable argument to be made that in the modern world the potential for everything you do to be filmed and shared with others amplifies those fear more than ever.

[sokka_h2otribe]

30 years ago you weren't recorded and if you were your recording didn't share across social media networks. This and awareness of it I suspect drives a greater fear of embarrassment. Although you did mention this, I wanted to emphasize it

[footydude]

Absolutely, it's definitely worth emphasising.

[ian_holt]

>In my experience, a decent proportion of people have always been nervous about joining in. I'd wager that for many of the onlookers it isn't driven by a creativity/participation thing, it's just a (pretty normal) fear of embarrassing themselves. Scroll back 30 years and I would undoubtedly be one of those awkward teenagers wanting to join in but scared to do so out of fear of embarrassing myself.

You just described me 40 odd years ago :))

[Redeemer06]

I’m really in the middle of what I should think about Gen AI, and to be honest, it disturbs me.

I’ve been playing guitar since I was very young. I have good skills, I can play hard songs, and I compose a lot on guitar, drums, and bass. I love the process of creating, but I’ve always hated using complicated applications just to get a clean recording or mess around with adding MIDI tracks.

Because of that, I recently tried a famous AI solution. I shared one of my really raw songs and used the AI to add violins and other instruments that I don't know how to play. The final song was, to be completely honest, really amazing.

But in the end, I didn’t feel like it was mine. I had this strong feeling of being an impostor. At the same time, it put me in this great energy, it opened up my head, made me really creative, and gave me a ton of new ideas of things to play on my guitar.

So like you said, there is this weird balance. As a musician, it feels strange to outsource the creation, but as a tool for energy and participation, it completely unlocked my creativity.

[Slackwise]

If you asked an "agent" to make something for you, you yourself did not create it. By definition. Whether it's AI or a person. You contributed only a piece. It's no longer yours. This is why any piece of art/music has everyone involved documented in credits. The phonies in the industry have ghostwriters write songs for them, like a majority of pop artists. Pop music is going to be even more fake soon.

[LocalExt]

I think AI is good as a 'muse' or getting idea (not just for music)...Creating anything with AI is as a ghostwriting. You are labeled as a creator, but you aren't. "...but as a tool for energy and participation, it completely unlocked my creativity." I totally agree...This could be the reason of AI in any kind of art.

[strogonoff]

Trying to “level the playing field” is antithetical to what art is. Art is about self-expression and communication.

If we viewed art as some sort of competition or race, then someone using neural–network-based generative tools could avoid losing the race; however, everybody would be participating in some sport A and the person using ML participates in a completely different sport B. Everyone is running, but one person is riding a scooter.

However, art is not a finite zero-sum game[0]. Despite what formal music education for kids sometimes tries to make it look like, it’s not a competition, there is no global ranking and scoring system for your skill. Many people have an intuitive understanding of that; try going to a live jam to see people participating regardless of their hypothetical skill level.

[0] As further reading on this topic more generally, I recommend Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse.

[mbonnet]

I agree. Art isn't a playing field!

[delis-thumbs-7e]

If you mean kids playground it is, you get to imagine anything you want andmaybe other human beings join you imagining and then you get to have fun. Sometimes ot doesn’t quite work and it is not so fun. Imagine one day one of the dads coming with a robot and saying the kids that instead of you playing you vcan tell this robot what to play and it will play for you. No needto get all tired and muddy.

[strogonoff]

The term “playing field” as far as I am aware usually implies the context of competitive sport, not play in the playful sense.

[delis-thumbs-7e]

I know. I’m intentionally expanding the meaning.

[mbonnet]

what makes you think you can unilaterally expand a very well-accepted meaning of a term, especially in a discussion that is basically semantics of the term?

[jappgar]

AI is the latest brick in the wall separating human beings from one another.

Your argument is like "people have been killing each other for centuries so when you think about it hydrogen bombs are not the problem"

[yousif_123123]

You know its not that much work to learn a couple of open chords on the guitar and be able to play some songs and participate. And its so so rewarding to play a song, even one you aren't really excited about, and to sing and accompany yourself even if its a song that's like 2-3 chords (like "You Can't Always Get What You Want" by the Rolling Stones). Just because its YOU making the music and the sounds, its immediately your interpretation and has your soul in it. It becomes so meaningful to you to people around you.

You don't have to say I wont be a rockstar, therefore let me use some AI to make a song, and in doing so give up on the joys of touching and making sounds with an instrument, a very old human thing we've been doing all over the world, having someone show you a song, or look up a youtube video and learning it from some random stranger.

Even better, being in love with a song and finally being able to play it yourself!

Maybe AI could've sufficed for Paul McCartney's interest in music, and provided a creative outlet. But we wouldn't have had something as great and as human as the legacy of the Beatles.

[madrox]

I was in a park today, and I watched a man play a saxaphone. Other people had stopped to listen to him play.

It occurred to me that we appreciate this kind of public performance, but we get annoyed if someone plays their boombox too loud in public.

I tend to agree with you about participation, but I feel like there is a note unsung here.

[csomar]

The way I see it. The saxophone player is annoying other people but he is showing his skills to the public. I can tolerate that and let it slip. On the other hand, the boombox jerk is playing music that anyone can privately play. The park is a public space and you should use headphones for that.

[zimzam]

When I first moved to NYC I was enchanted and delighted by the various people singing or playing music on the subway but over time it became an annoyance - if I want to listen to music I’ll play it myself.

Please don’t force me to attend your concert by performing in the subway car. I don’t want to be your captive audience. Even more so for people who don’t use headphones.

[darkwater]

> I tend to agree with you about participation, but I feel like there is a note unsung here.

I think we value _effort_.

[autoexec]

And skill. Using AI is basically zero effort and tends to produce half-assed output. It's no wonder people are put off by it.

[Kaijo]

Authenticity (as Gidon Kremer once said), above all, is what is genuinely felt, and the inner world of a dedicated listener who has built up a relationship with their music over a lifetime is full of genuine feeling. It _is_ participation, not mere consumption. Even if the act of listening is a private one. Art forms need properly attentive audiences.

I say this as a decent pianist who collaborates, performs, teaches, records. And who messes around with AI with great fascination. Music is so broad and diverse in the experiences it can provide and the social functions it stands in relation to. Separate channels and bubbles can be good, the signs of a tree of life diversifying. Your lakeside vignette doesn’t say anything about something wrong in music and culture, it’s just a normal thing that happens whenever people chill out by a lake throughout human history. Off-key singing and dancing to salsa and reggaeton? I wouldn’t be nervous about joining in, I’d be heading to the opposite side of the lake. And that’s good too – how personal music can be, that that’s your thing, not my thing.

[yard2010]

On the other hand it allows teleportation. When I'm vibing in an Infected Mushroom concert with a few hundred people I can feel as if I'm on a beach stroll listening on my headphones, just the other people can actually hear what I hear and being neurally activated the same way I do.

When I'm on a beach stroll listening to Infected in my headphones I can imagine many people at the beach would be dancing with me if they shared my reality. It's just that reality became much more fragmented. It has some drawbacks but I like to see the good parts in it.

A hundred years ago, in order to feel that spiritual feeling of listening to such music, you had to be in proximity to the artists, which was really limiting. I'm grateful that I don't have to be physically near Infected Mushroom to feel the way their music makes me feel. It feels like time travel. Instead of moving yourself in time, you move the sound waves, summon them from alternate universes, right into your ears. This process is as magical as the whole experience.

[jstummbillig]

> Something went wrong with music and culture in recent times. Participation became consumption.

I think closer to truth is: Participation became production.

More people are doing more things (including with instruments) but often times in a digital setting, sometimes more isolated and sometimes much more public (think: Twitch streams where chat is part of the whole social experience in a way that was never true for TV or other live events of that scale). More participatory online and more individualized as consumption, while some older forms of face-to-face amateur participation have become less socially normal or less visible.

This says not so much about music or culture really; it seems fairly aligned with where our lives and how we connect have moved more broadly.

[watwut]

Imo where I am from, asking people not used to dance to dance in public was always tall order.

And when you look at broader culture, people dancing seem to welcome only small or bigger mockery, unless they dance really well.

[TuringNYC]

>> Concerts became about filming a DJ twiddling a USB controller.

This is one of the worst parts of any concert, performance -- having a sea of phones in front of you recording. In a dark theatre, it is impossible to watch the actual performance when you have a screen on super-bright in front of you recording it. Also, some people literally record on ipads!

All these are reasons i've not opted to do "concert in my living room" via YouTube and a big screen tv. Not the same, but a lot less silliness around me.

[quietbritishjim]

That sounds fantastic but it's essentially a different subject.

You seem to be dismissing any music that you don't have some pretty close participation in. Did it all start to go downhill with the invention of the gramaphone? Listening to Ella Fitzgerald or Vera Lynn or Elvis or Frank Sinatra was irrelevant for those that weren't actively jamming along with them?

I'm being facetious, I know you don't really mean that. My point is, listening (on your own, with no musical skill) to good quality music made by a real human is a valid activity. That's under threat, and the fact that making your own music with your friends isn't (or at least is less so) shouldn't detract from that.

[spiderfarmer]

People can do whatever they want, but they shouldn't expect an audience.

[deaton]

I think many people do see value though in the knowledge that a human took the time to create a creative work though. Its the same sort of difference you see between music made by someone who makes music because they like making music, and corporate music. The latter was historically kept in check though by the amount of talent necessary to get taken seriously to make anything.

[A_Venom_Roll]

I loved reading this, thanks for sharing your take

[filoeleven]

https://fuckoffaimusic.com/

Q: What about the people doing interesting things with AI in their music? Some people are doing interesting things so isn’t it worth giving those ones a chance?

A: sorry maybe they are but unfortunately i’m part of the fuck off ai music movement so count me out?

Q: But AI is just another way for people to express themselves

A: sorry that may or may not be the case but either way i’m part of the fuck off ai music movement?

[spaceman_2020]

I use AI as an amateur producer simply to get ideas

I would NEVER EVER consider using AI in something I actually release to listeners

I don't care if its good or bad. If I'm making someone listen something, it should've been touched by my hand - even if that means turning a knob in a DAW

[acaloiar]

To be honest, this comment reads to me like LLM output.

You have a history of comments that were clearly written by a human, with character, but this comment stands out to me as an outlier. It has that semi-neutral, slightly pontificating tone of an LLM that just feels off in a way that's difficult to articulate.

I truly mean no offense. There's clearly a human behind this account.

[gavin-1]

You shouldn't be getting down voted. That comment was definitely generated by an LLM and it was actually disturbing to me that so many people were replying as if it weren't glaringly obvious.

It's not foo, it's bar. Baz became qux. That's foobar. Baar baaz — quux quuz.

[ShinyLeftPad]

> Something went wrong with music and culture in recent times. Participation became consumption.

There's probably more original music being created now than any time in history. Constant promotion of AI music is why you think it's not the case.

> Concerts became about filming a DJ twiddling a USB controller.

If you think being a DJ is more consumption than shouting cover songs near a lake, maybe you should try learn be a good DJ

> If AI music allows someone with less formal musical skills to feel like they are joining in and making something, then maybe it has its value.

If you are a musician you know there're absolute geniuses who have ZERO formal music skills completely self taught. Some are world famous names we all know. That was never the problem.

> I honestly couldn't tell — or maybe care — if many of the Bachata songs played at parties are fully or partially AI-generated. I suspect a lot are. But most of the reason I'm there is not to fetishize the authenticity of music, but to hang out with friends and dance and have a good time.

You contradict yourself. If music really doesn't matter then why AI? The crippling fear of supporting a real human musician somewhere?

[chadgpt3]

Filming a DJ

[ShinyLeftPad]

I just focused on how the work of DJ is reduced to "twiddling USB controller". But if you want to dig into that filming part, let's goo, because it's at best irrelevant and at worst harmful.

Irrelevant because if you are NOT filming you don't magically become people participating in art which is what that comment is about. You don't expect people at a show to play.

Harmful because if you ask any real musician or event organizer who's not very famous already, filming & posting and tagging is probably the biggest way to support them that you can do as audience. On par with actually coming to the show. For two reasons, it spreads word of mouth to people's followers and it gives musician/venue promo material. I chatted with many performers after events and they are always grateful for this.

And anyway literally no one pays ticket money to spend the entire show fimling. No one wants to be unpaid video guy. People film some bits to post and then hang out with others which is why they're there. Grifters who actually film entire shows hoping to earn more money than they spent on the ticket are annoying but very rare and they only go to already famous performers.