Comment by thelucent
15 hours ago
I did the same too. I listen exclusively to my own songs made with the help of AI.
My styles are orchestra and symphony pop, which I find rare these days. Even if it exists, the lyrics might not be something that I enjoy.
So I just write my own lyrics, decides on the melodies, and put it to AI to create a polished version.
Do I feel emotional when I listen to it? Of course, its my own lyrics that I wrote. Of course I sing along with it because its the melodies I chose.
And its even more emotional because I relate to it.
Someone can create some songs with billion listeners and emotional for others, but if it doesn’t relate to me. What am I supposed to feel?
My listener wont be able to relate with me personally because they don’t know me. But they might be able to resonates with my songs because it triggers specific memories or emotions for them. And for me that’s enough. Let the songs be the one that they resonates with.
> orchestra and symphony pop
You can find a ton of this on archive.org [0]. One of my favorites is from K-Mart background vinyl. AI can't quite do this yet.
[0] https://archive.org/search?query=subject%3A%22Kmart%22&and%5...
That's actually a bit creepy to me. How do you deal with a lack of novelty factor here though? Because ultimately, if you yourself generate all music you listen to, how could anything be surprising? I often listen to songs that surprise me in one way or another.
When I said exclusively, its not that I am not exposed to other songs as well. I do follow certain artists that I really enjoy listening to because I find their lyrics and melodies resonates with me, even when its not in the genre that I preferred.
It's just I don't go and explore songs actively. If my playlist suddenly randomize itself (which YouTube Music usually do even when I already selected a specific playlist), I usually just keep it randomizing the songs, I either skip the songs based on the intro or just the title.
Sometimes, I only write the lyrics without any melodies, or just give a base chords for the AI to work with without any melodies, and AI might surprise me on how it suddenly chose a certain melodies or chord progression.
So you can say I'm exploring, but only within the boundaries of the lyrics that I wrote. Or when YouTube Music randomly plays a song for me and I immediately resonates with it.
Does it really have to be suprising? Some people already have a life full of surprises (read: stress). Comforting music can help with that.
That's like saying that in order to not be stressed you can only read books that you write yourself. Are we seriously going to act like any of this is normal or healthy?
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If you write your own songs, you'll realise that they are infinitely surprising to you, much like one's own children. Just endlessly fascinating. I sing my own songs all the time, probably more than other people's.
Of course, that doesn't mean I don't want to listen to new music by other people, or create more of my own. I'm simply sharing what it is to experience songs written by yourself. I saw Sting the other day talking about the very same thing to Rick Beato regarding songs he wrote 40 years ago, and I remember Brett Anderson of Suede saying that he loved listening to his own music. In fact, wouldn't it be weird if you didn't want to?
That's the feelings right? What's wrong with enjoying your creation right?
The song that I wrote has more values because it carries memories, emotions, and my internal state. I'm not saying other songs doesn't have values. It's just harder to resonate with, unless the melodies or lyrics align with my emotional state.
I listen to my own songs because I am songwriter, and still am even when I stopped doing it professionally. I am not doing it for the sake of "I just want to listen to my own songs and I will never listen to others". I listen just because "This song is meaningful for me"
And the "this song" in that quote above, can be mine, or other's.
Childish Gambino (Donald Glover) said something similar when asked if he listens to his own music. Paraphrased: There's this weird stigma about listening to your own music like it's egotistical. When you make yourself a sandwich, do you feel egotistical when you enjoy eating it?
Im a hobbyist songwriter (melodies and lyricist) of decades feeding my trove of MP3s/songs to Suno. Listening to Suno produced version of my songs is way more satisfying then listening to other peoples music. My Suno slop of many decades has the most meaning as they all reflect a time, experience, a feeling in and about life to current world events, etc, etc. Before Suno I was singing my songs heard in my demos (play piano & guitar) and Im a terrible singer now they all sound pro and again are way more meaningful then anyone elses songs.
> My listener wont be able to relate with me personally because they don’t know me
What a perfect illustration that while you typed on a keyboard you're so far away from making art.
PS: how many pieces of art that moved you were made by artists you knew or met?
I might misunderstood you or you might misunderstood me.
I was moved by a lot of songs made by artists I never met. But I was moved because of the song, not because of the reason why the artist wrote it. If I can truly understand the emotional state of the artist when they wrote it, I might be able to empathize with them. But that's me empathizing with the person that made the art as a human. Nothing stopping me from doing that as a human, even when their song didn't move me.
I publish my songs under a pseudonyms. They can infer what am I as a person based on the songs that I wrote. They can infer what emotions and feelings that I am experiencing while I write the songs. But it's all inference, unless they know me behind the pseudonyms, they won't be able to relate with me personally, as my real self, not as the songwriter. And I am okay with that.
Well, I was being overly cynical for no reason. Do what makes you happy man, if that's AI songs who am I to judge. You clearly care a lot about it and it brings you something.
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What's so weird about creating your own stuff? If I paint something stupid (like by numbers) and hang it in my room you're going to judge me?
This is not fine art, but it is creative. Lots and lots of creative pursuits are just tweaking shit others have provided as building blocks. I don't see how AI is different in this case.
Maybe this is were we will end up, society combined of individualistic, self-centered, non-empathetic, sociopaths. But can it be still called society?
My point was narrower. When I write the lyrics, choose the melody, and use AI to help turn it into a polished arrangement, the result has personal meaning to me. It reflects my memories, taste, and emotional state. That does not make it superior to other music. It just makes it personal. I can resonates with songs made by other people if it align with my current emotional state.
I just don't spent time actively exploring new songs to listen to. I spent more time writing my own expression than exploring other expressions.
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