Anderton

"ARA shared an open letter called 'Stop Devaluing Music' that implores developers and tech companies to cease 'the assault on human creativity.'" A lot of good that's going to do. Music started the devaluation process when Napster appeared, and the iPod ran with it. Then streaming services put the final nail in the coffin. Like Amazon says on their packaging, "millions of songs for free!" That says it all. The music business is on life support, and AI will remove even that. The only hope is if consumers develop more refined musical tastes, vote with their dollars for the non-AI-generated music, make a conscious decision to support their favorite artists, and the people explolting generative AI say "hmmm, maybe this is wrong and we shouldn't do it." I'd place the odds of that series of events happening at 1,000:1 against.

Totally! Think of it this way. There's a row of objects with spaces between them. Behind it is another row of objects, which you can see through the spaces. If looked at head-on from the front, you can clearly see the differentiation of where the front row object ends, and the object in the back. That's stereo. With Atmos, it's like you're standing 10 feet higher, and looking down on the two rows of objects. You can see their spatial relationship to each other much better, although the dividing lines between the objects as seen from the front aren't as obvious. Hmmm...maybe I should draw a picture.

Wow. People really aren't very bright.

That looks very cool. Also, May is going to have some interesting news about what Microsoft is doing with Qualcomm. And I have to admit, that little copilot button that just got added to my display's lower right is getting a LOT of use. I use it to ask questions as trivial as "Does PreSonus capitalize 'view' in 'Arrange view'"? and a couple seconds later, I get the answer and it's right. Didn't need to open a browser or anything, it's in the OS. Being able to generate illustrations, titles, and text rewrites, as well as coordinate schedules in Copilot, is also cool. For creative stuff Copilot doesn't always get it right by any means, but it hits a surprisingly high percentage. I think Mac and Windows users are going to be very happy over the course of the next year. Apple will keep tweaking the ecosystem so well that you'd be crazy to venture outside of it.

Headphones! I render to binaural, because I post my music on YouTube. YouTube can't play back multichannel files (at least not yet) but binaural isn't a problem. Judging by the PreSonus forums, most users don't realize what it means that Atmos can render to binaural. Given that a huge number of people listen on headphones these days, this isn't as much of a limitation as it may seem. I liken it to when stereo came out. Not everyone had stereo turntables, so records were released in mono and stereo. Eventually, stereo took over.

I'd vote for the latter as being worse. I use algorithmic composition a lot in what I do. For example, I have a way to generate drum fills using Studio One's probability slider in the pattern generator, and note shuffling. I do the same as you - initiate the macro a few times, and when there's something cool, I keep it. But the fills are based on a note framework I created, using a macro I wrote, whose suitability I determine, with edits I create if needed. So I see it as more of an interactive experience compared to pulling loops from a "make these dope hit beats with this dope hit MIDI pack."

I think there's a differentiation between players and composers. What you're describing happens to me in the studio. It happened to me playing live as well, and don't get me wrong, I love playing live. But for me, composng/recording doesn't come with the same kind of logistical downsides.

So that's one aspect. The other is that if it's impossible to support yourself by playing music, then people will play music only for their own satisfaction. I don't make music to make a living. Been there, done that. It was fun and profitable while it lasted. Eventually you reach a point where enough is enough. Doing music purely for myself is more fun that going to the CBS studios at 52nd street and playing a session for an alcoholic country and western singer making a comeback...or touring the backwaters of the USA. But I'll NEVER say "enough is enough" about making music. I'm making kick-ass music that probably 99.9% of the people in these forums have never heard. Am I going to go out of my way to get more "engagement"? Why? I put it out there. If people want to find it, fine. If they don't, they won't know what they're missing so it doesn't matter whether they would love it or hate it. Do I care about having more people hear what I do? Of course. The comments I get on my YouTube channel are immensely gratifying. But do I care enough to prioritize getting more people to hear what I do? No. I'd rather spend my time making music instead of marketing it, which as far as I can tell is the way the business works these. Bottom line: Whether or not AI takes over won't matter to me, or the people who listen to my music. Should I care more about that?

I think it's entirely possible that most people will be satisfied with "the look and feel" of music and not care that it sounds more or less like 72 billion similar songs. Will AI produce a Brandenberg Concerto or Sketches of Spain? Probably not, at least in the near future, but most people don't listen to classical or jazz music anyway. I think music becomes more than background music only if tied in with a social movement. That happened with the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, and started to fizzle out in the 90s when grunge became a significant factor. It was a localized movement, not a world-wide one. The only social movement I see these days is people being angry and upset about a huge variety of subjects. So, maybe the only music with a chance to make a difference to listeners will be Nu Punk. You heard it here first

This comment from Analogika in a different thread is too provocative not to have its own thread: Just saw an interview snippet with Trent Reznor on music streaming, and he phrased it thusly: "I think that people just want to turn the faucet on and have music come in. They're not really concerned about all the romantic shit I thought mattered." We always thought music mattered to most people the way it matters to us. Most people don't give a shit, and most people never did. People didn't believe me 25 years ago, when I said that for the vast majority, "music" is something they switch on on a device on the windowsill when they walk in the office. It's interspersed with news and the odd interview. Occasionally, something familiar comes on; that's nice. This is also why A.I.-generated music will take over a large portion of the market (yeah, other thread, I know): in reality, most people just never gave a shit.

Well, it has the "look and feel" of music.

The person I compete with the most is who I was last week.

WE got to see the clouds get darker

I too learn something new every day around here.

The definition of competition is much broader than sporting events (or commerce). In its most general meaning, according to ChapGPT's summary from multiple dictionaries, "competition encompasses the effort to outperform others, secure resources, or achieve success in various contexts." By saying "get better" I think the logical result would be that those who get better will outperform those who don't. But that's only one facet of competition. Another one is "achieve success," and having regular gigs and getting paid for them seems at least to me to qualify as success. As to securing resources, gigs are a finite resource. So, by definition, people compete for those finite resources by getting better to outperform others. I think at least in Notes's case, competition definitely applies to what he does. I certainly don't pick up on him being mad, just adapting to the current reality of his milieu. On the other hand, I doubt we will ever see him compete in a javelin throw, or pro wrestling 🤣 But I've never met the guy, maybe he's 220 pounds of pure muscle 🤔

Some of the parallel discussions in other threads made me realize that there are two different types of gigs. The one I'm thinking of is more like something that would happen in a theater, where people are there specifically to see the act. But if I was gigging in a bar or place where the music wasn't the primary focus, then I can understand where backing tracks would be essential so you have a full sound going on, with complete control over volume. Hmmm...maybe I need to do my one-off Halloween gig, but then come up with a different act for other venues...assuming I want to play other venues. Oddly enough, I've never played a gig where the music wasn't the primary, if not only, reason people were there. I've been lucky.

When there's a limited pool of gigs, you're competing with the others who want to access that pool. At least it's not a blood sport, and no one gets concussions

It's unavoidable looking in the direction of the sun from time to time, but the eclipse lasts over an hour. If you're going to stare at the sun for 10 or 15 minutes, it's probably not a good idea. That's what "sun gazer" people advocate. The problem is if there's a situation where the sun focuses through the lens to the retina. That depends on the angle of your eye to the sun and also the intensity on any given day - humidity, pollution, closeness to the horizon, smoke, etc. For example the potential for eye damage is much less at sunset and sunrise. It's very much like audio. You can listen at levels that won't damage your hearing permanently if the exposure is under a certain amount of time. But if it's over a certain amount of time, the cilia in your ears become damaged and don't recover.

At the turn of the century I had a solo act that was really complex - two Ensoniq ASRs, all hardware, guitar, voice, mixer, keyboard, etc. It needed split second timing and sometimes I didn't get it right. BUT I had a safety net - a Minidisc with some really funny recordings, like excerpts from "Hoe to Speak Hip." I could cue those up and the audience thought it was part of the act, while I sorted out what went wrong.

I realize you will find this hard to believe, but there's some conspiracy people posting videos who say you should look directly at the eclipse, no problem, the whole thing about it damaging your eyes is BS and just a way to get you to buy those eclipse glasses. And what's more, the eclipse proves that the earth is flat. (huh?) To be fair, though,this does lend credence to the conspiracy theory that chemtrails have covered us with Stupidity Dust.

What? I didn't know that tracks had become a requirement. Why? Joni Mitchell opened for us several times, it was just her and a guitar, and she was AWESOME with a rivetting stage presence. So the Joni Mitchells of the future will have to use backing tracks?!? I don't get it. And here I was planning on doing a live act with no tracks because I could generate bass from the guitar, add a harmony processor to my voice, and use a drum machine with footswitching to do fills and transitions...guess I'm finally a dinosaur. Better dust off the ol' sequencer and kiss spontaneity goodbye, which (silly me) I always thought was part of the charm of live performance.

Said over-the-hill singer does "an evening with [singer's name)," puts together a kick-ass band of people who can play the music, and finds a good singer who sounds like the "real thing." Then the star plays some miscellaneous instruments, does the occasional harmony, tells stories of life on the road, gets people onstage and does audience interactions, has a video in the background with pictures of the band in its heyday, and puts on an entertaining evening. Peter Asher does something very much like this. It's a lot of fun, doesn't demean him at all, doesn't put one over on the audience, and it doesn't matter that he's 142 years old.

New York is at risk from a lot of little interconnected faults that could trigger a chain reaction. I think the Palisades and Ramapo faults are substantial, but infrequent.

I hear ya. If I end up putting a live act together (as mentioned in another thread), it's gonna be my real voice...not because I have the world's greatest voice, but because I truly think having a human quality to it will make the act more appealing. Besides, I need to leverage any advantage I can That was a lesson learned from watching Martina McBride. She did not use Auto-Tune and even though there were a handful (and only a handful) of not-quite-there notes, having REAL, expressive vocals were a treat.

This song has a denser mix than my last Atmos vs. Stereo comparison, and I think the difference is pretty obvious. Again, the Atmos version is headphones only. But there's a twist: I added an EQ curve to the stereo mix that made the overall EQ response more like the Atmos one. I can't help but wonder if Atmos hypes the response a bit. (This blog post gives more information on making downmixes more "Atmosey." It uses Studio One, but applies to any DAW with Atmos mixing.) This made the stereo downmix sound a bit more like the Atmos mix. Anyway...check 'em out, I think y'all will dig the production, regardless of any other factors.