Technology Will Not Ruin Music

Google opened its music-generation AI MusicLM to the public. Unfortunately, there is a waitlist, so I cannot yet play with it. However, there are some examples on their GitHub page where it’s possible to get an idea of what it is capable of. In a nutshell, you prompt Music LM with a text, and it returns with some music. It only sounds great sometimes, but this is a work in progress, so it will improve over time.

People fear this will increase the amount of “worthless” music swamping the streaming services for fraud. But that is not AI’s fault: it is easy to create 31-second clips with decent musicality in minutes on a laptop using traditional means like samples and programmed beats.

Moreover, even in “serious” music, we have long passed the point where a human hand or vocal cord directly creates every sound. In his masterclass, hit producer Timbaland demonstrates how he works: he sits with three men in a studio and fiddles with laptops and a mixing board until they have something good enough for a top liner to come in and add the vocals. Of course, there goes a lot of experience in what they do, and it is fascinating to see how a musical idea takes shape into what could be a chart-topping hit. But the overall process is closer to engineering a product for sale than creating art.

The point is not that Al-supported music generation will make it too easy to create music. Remember, there are already 100,000 songs per day uploaded to the streaming services. Success now and in the future depends much more on the stories around the artist, a song, or an album than on how the music is created. Interestingly – according to a survey by Water & Music – many musicians hope that they can get AI support with the constant need for self-promoting on social media.

Of course, much more change is coming, but things have already changed significantly in the last decades. And there is no reason to believe everything will be worse just because we have more sophisticated tools.

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Song Pick of the Day

Listen to/watch all seven songs on YouTube. Follow our daily updated playlists on YouTube and Spotify for the 50 latest Song Picks of the Day.

Girl As Wave is the project of New York-based singer/songwriter Marci Elizabeth. At glamglare, we have been featuring her music since 2018, and she only offers abstract graphics somewhat mysteriously instead of press shots. However, her 80s-tinged synth-pop is too delicious to pass. Check out her latest song, "Future Version," as an example.

"Stop Dreaming" is not the usual advice you expect from a pop song. But, for Danish singer/songwriter Astrid Cordes, this phrase describes the moment when you realize that life took a different turn than what you hoped for. Which is often for the better: "But here I am, happily stuck in a new role and part of life," she says.

Jo Bartlett is an artist from the UK who has founded and organized a 35,000-people festival in Wales. The resulting stress levels have contributed to phases of insomnia in her life. However, he has learned to deal with it and treats it "like an old friend who gets on your nerves a bit but you know them well and take an odd solace in their company." Her new song, "Floating Through," is about that experience.

Kaelen Ohm is a Canadian artist who records music as AMAARA. The first single of her upcoming debut album Child of Venus is an infectious track about "the impermanence of new stages of love, and how we can get left in the dark with our emotions after the fire burns out" – something she calls with a bit of dark humor "New Love's Mortal Coil." There is also an entertaining dance video choreographed by Tatiana Parker, where three professional dancers join Kaelen.

We enjoyed Velvet Vision's "Springtime Buzz" in March '21, so we're happy to announce that mastermind Betty Taylor has a full album, Together, ready for release on June 30. The first single, "Comfortable," is the album's opener and sets the tone with glittering, bright synth-pop made for "fans of dance parties, locking eyes with someone you love across a crowded room, and scream-singing about wanting to quit your job."

Last Friday, New York duo Bunny X released their second album, Love Minus 80. They borrowed the title from a science-fiction novel about romance in the age of cryogenics. Their signature 80s Italo-Disco-inspired sound works well in this context. They also enlisted Orion of Thought Beings for the title track, which gives the song an unexpected twist.

We're going out on Bar Bandora, the project of UK musician Charlie Tophill. She borrowed her moniker from an artist's café in Madrid that inspired her solo songwriting. "Ultramess" is a playful take on the absurdity of falling in love.

Also Happening at glamglare

What the hell is "indie sleaze"? An NME article that celebrates new New York artists (thank you!) uses this term all over the place. Have you ever heard it? We lived on the Lower East Side at the height of the supposed "indie sleaze" but never heard of this term before this year. Even ChatGPT says: "I couldn't find any information on a term specifically referred to as "Indie Sleaze" within the context you mentioned."

Elke and I are huge Queen fans, so we were both shocked when we did not recognize "Cool Cat" as one of their songs. It is even on Hot Space, the first (and only) Queen album I've ever bought. Our only excuse is that Freddy Mercury sings the song in an unusual falsetto. There is another interesting tidbit: Together with "Under Pressure," "Cool Cat" was the second song featuring David Bowie before he requested his vocals to be removed. You can find the original version online, but there is little to hear of Bowie.

Pop singer/songwriter Sophie Colette has released her debut EP Kisses From Clay Street. We have known her since 2018 and witnessed how much heart and soul she threw into the four songs throughout the pandemic years. Now residing in Richmond, VA, we hope she'll return to NYC for a show later this year.

Also released last Friday: Jenny Bakke's Morild, an all-out electronic record. "It takes courage to explore," she says and explores what she has on this record.

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