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Friday Fun Thread for May 31, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I've wanted to talk about AI music for a while. It's decent for the certain types of music, specifically pop songs with simple voice leading and harmony. When asking for specific instrumentation or a specific musical style it seems to fail pretty bad. For example, if I wanted specific instrumentation for a chamber piece, it's currently impossible for it to create a string quartet in the style of Brahms. Al 'classical' generations are psudo-orchestral works similar to the most generic Marval movie anthems, not like the incredibly nuanced creations of Stravinsky, Messiaen, or Bach where each musical line matters. It adheres strictly to conventional tonality no matter how much you try to prompt your way into serialism, asymmetrical rhythm, jazz, etc. Much like previous AI music it really avoids key changes and any more complex musical ideas.

Does AI Djent? A decent bit, to be honest. But does it Stravinsky? We're a long ways off.

They’re OK but so far they seem to lack the real killer feature of being able to make actually catchy hooks, at least from my prompting. They can make real sounding very mid music, like this or ‘lost records’ YouTube compilations generated by the AI.

I feel like LLMs are in a similar spot. They can write OK. They can’t write anything truly impressive. They can’t write fiction like Joyce or non-fiction like the best New Yorker journalism. The question is whether that’s just a minor revision away, whether it requires some tinkering with the training set, or whether it’s actually possible that there are limitations that prevent generation of 99.9th percentile art without architectural changes at the least.

The nice part about it is now I can make placeholder music for my games without feeling bad. Maybe even some mediocre music for a youtube video background or whatever.

I don't need actually good music, just mid enough that it won't be super awful.

They can make real sounding very mid music

TBF, that barely differs from the top 40 these days.