Is the use of A.I. likely to impact the future of Metal music?
With all the other more immediate threats going on in the world, I haven't found myself getting too invested in the debate surrounding the increasing use of A.I. technology, but I guess it will become more and more of an issue in coming years.
I read that Glen Benton has been taking some heat for using AI to produce the cover of the new Deicide album, so I got to thinking what would the ramifications for metal be if the technology went beyond being used for just the artwork and entered the realm of music writing itself. Could it be possible to buy a program that could replicate the songwriting of any musicians from Darkthrone to Dream Theater? And, most importantly to my mind, could you tell the difference?
Has anyone else pondered the implications, I would love to hear everyone's thoughts.
It's very possible for AI to create a metal album from scratch & is likely already happening. We were very close to using AI for the Neuropath cover art but the application our designer was using ended up blocking anything even remotely graphic & the ideas we were previously looking at were particularly graphic so we opted to look for real artwork instead which ended up with a pretty great result.
Pestilence has also taken some heat for the original AI cover of their re-recording album Levels of Perception, and as a result, they ended up using a different cover art featuring all the band members. But whether or not people keep putting down AI art/music for being fake or mangling copyrighted work, there's no escape from the inevitable evolution of technology. I gotta admit, I've explored countless AI-produced pieces of art and music and I enjoy them as long as they're used in a respectable and respectful manner. Some examples of AI metal that I like include several of those band vocalist cover experimentations, those AI Plankton voice tracks made by Boi What, and this DragonForce "demo track" someone made as an April Fool's Joke:
In my opinion, if you are actively listening to metal music (artwork I get is different) generated by AI then you are killing metal. It's smash and grab, attention seeking, cop out media in its worst form and embodies everything I hate about how "anyone" can produce "art" nowadays by doing next to nothing. Everyone can have a platform to voice their opinion like it means anything by sharing words they read somewhere else in a different order etc......stops old man rant in due course.
AI has its place, I do not dispute that. In terms of its positive contributions to the world of medicine etc, it is a much welcomed thing. I feel that without proper regulation it risks abuse and I am not convinced that anyone has any real grip and control of it in that regard. I see from their home page that Metal Archives will no longer accept submissions that prove to be AI generated which I fully support.
Do you really think the big corporations will use AI for the reproduction of art in a "respectable and respectful manner" or will they try to exploit it for corporate gain, Andi? I suggest their track record indicates the latter. Surely art, in whatever form it takes, is an expression of the human condition and is completely dependent on the lived experience of the person behind it. If a machine can replicate that at the press if a button, does it not devalue that piece of art? Or are we quite happy to be mere consumers, in the vein of The Matrrix and art have no deeper meaning than a transitory sensitory experience with no emotional currency?
I wasn't thinking about big corporations, Sonny, just people using AI in general. Sadly, AI or not, big corporations of entertainment media don't care about what is really tolerated, they just want to gain money.
In my opinion, if you are actively listening to metal music (artwork I get is different) generated by AI then you are killing metal. It's smash and grab, attention seeking, cop out media in its worst form and embodies everything I hate about how "anyone" can produce "art" nowadays by doing next to nothing. Everyone can have a platform to voice their opinion like it means anything by sharing words they read somewhere else in a different order etc......stops old man rant in due course.
AI has its place, I do not dispute that. In terms of its positive contributions to the world of medicine etc, it is a much welcomed thing. I feel that without proper regulation it risks abuse and I am not convinced that anyone has any real grip and control of it in that regard. I see from their home page that Metal Archives will no longer accept submissions that prove to be AI generated which I fully support.
I am completely with you there, Vinny. In scientific endeavours I am sure AI has a role to play, but I don't think AI has any place at all in art, which, at it's best, is essentially an expression of the artist's humanity.
Could we get to a point with AI generated art though, where it could fake it sufficiently well to fool most people. I'm sure we all like to think we could see through it, but will that always be the case?
I haven't seen the Metal Archives homepage yet, but this suggests that there are already AI-generated metal releases. Is that so, and if it is, do we know what any of them are? I originally posited this as a hypothetical question, I didn't think it was already happening.
To my dismay, a quick google search has already thrown up a ton of AI metal generators and plenty of people willing to embrace it. I can't even begin to express how depressed that makes me.
They cite a “noticeable uptick” in submissions of bands with AI generated music. They also acknowledge that this is a “work in progress”. No names mentioned.