The Future of AI and Creativity

Hello and welcome to Birdcast the flagship podcast of the Puerto Rico song. I'm your friend David Peerce and today on the show, we're talking about AI music. Specifically, what happens when you can suddenly make a song with just a prompt And then you can let other people listen to that song either on the app that you use to make it, or you can publish that song and millions of others like it everyvery streaming service everywhere How does that change the way we make and experience music? How does that change the music business? How does that change what music even is going forward Virgin Terrance O'Brian is going to come on and we're going to talk all about it But first, here's everything else going on the Vverge today This is ninety seconds onn the Vverge for Tuesday, july fourteenth, twenty twenty six. The X algorithm is a disaster, and it might be about to get at least a little tiny bit better N Kita Beer, who's the company's head of productuct, said that the algorithm hasn't been considering whether you follow someone back when deciding who to show your posts to, and that your friends, your mutuals, were showing up less in your replies as a result Beer said that this turned your replies into, quote, a battleground with people you don't recognize, which is a perfect description of the X experience Beer and X appear to be working on a bunch of changes designed to promote original content and stuff you actually care about rather than you know, Rage Bait and Elon Musk. I'm not holding my breath on any of it. Meanwhile, we've gotten a very clear look now at the next generation of Pixel and Pixel Watch The big news here is colors. If some now deleted Amazon listings are to be believed at least We're getting green, blue, purple, orange, black, and most of all, hot pink pixels, and black, silver and two shades of gold on the pixel watch, plus some cool new bam colors. Listen to me. If you've never bought a cool color phone, I promise you, it's worth it. I have a green iPhone seventeen I love it and it's mostly because it's green. And fininally, New York Governor Kathy Hol signed the US's first statewide moratorium on hyperscale data centers, all in order to give the state some time to figure out proper environmental and energy regulations The moratorium is written to last up to a year, which is basically time to figure out how and whether data centers can be good neighbors More and more people would just tell you the answer is no. You can read more about all this at theverge. com dot That's ninety seconds on the Vverge for Tuesday, july fourteenth If you sit in the sun, you may just get burned But some people are willing to take that chance. There is this certain degree of nihilism of like, oh, well the world is bad anyway, why wouldn't I just also get a tan? Tan maxing? That's this week on Explain it to mee Find new episodes wherever you get your podcasts Support for the show comes from serervice Now. AI is moving fast across the enterprise, but without visibility, it's just chaos. Different tools, different models, different teams using AI in completely different ways Service Now turns that chaos into control With the AI control tower, you see all your AI across the business in one place. What it's doing, what it's done and what it's about to do, so you stay in control To putut AI to work for people, visit serviceNow. com. Let's talk AI and music. Joining me now the Vversers wee eror Tr OBrian. Hi Terrce. wecome to the show Hey, David, thanks for having me. So I want both Tererennce O'Brien, weekend editor of the Virge and Terrennce O'Brien gigantic musician and music nerd who currently has his laptop stacked on a pile of CD's to both join us for this show. Do you think we can do that? I think we absolutely can do that. Okay, cool. I want to start by talking about SUNo, which is the AI music platform that you've been covering a bunch over the last several months. and really kind of over the last year, I think this company has become increasingly important in the music space And I want you to start just for people who don't know by telling me both what Suno says it is and what SUNo actually seems to be in the world right now. because my sense is those are Relatively different things at the moment I mean, they they definitely are different things. If you would ask Mikey Schulman, the CEO of Suno, you know, he would say that it's about deemocratizing access to the tools of creation. It's about lowering the barrier of entry for music making. Write a song with a prompt Pereay, great creativity, right? Like that's That's a pitch. I think Mikey Schulman kind of gives the whole game away, honestly. He very famously quoted as saying people don't enjoy making music And then I would just say you don't belong making music Yeah If you don'tjoy making music you don't have to make mus. I think yes that's fine and fair. and It seems to me that a sort of my experience of Suno in the world right now is less than it is completely creative set of tools for people to make music. and just practically speaking, a way for people to make really similar covers of existing songs Owhelmingly the stuff I have experienced in the world is you know, and we've talked about this bunch on the show, like blues cover of a Taylor Swift song is like a thing people want to make an experience and that stuff is out there in the world I would think is not at all what Suno would like you to believe that it's about both for like creative reasons and for sort of straightforward business and copyright reasons, But that's at least how I experience, you know, is that What you see out in the world too? Absolutely. I think like there is some of that fully AI generated like original music and I'm using quotes for those who are listening and not watching there. I would say the most visible use case, the most pular use case for AI and SUNo or whatever other model you want to use UDO. is these like genre transfer covers, there's Nick Harrison, I think they call him the professor. He got very famous on TikTok and Instagram for a little while, making basically like startarting out with like yacht rock covers of songs and then eventually spinning off into other genres. and sure the first time you're like, oh cover of disturbed that sounds like Steely Dan sure is kind of funny. By How many times can you do that And, you know Once you start digging into like the ethical stuff as you keep doing it, it becomes a little bit problematic I do think you could argue that most songs would sound better as yacht rock songs But there's also something in that process that has tripped me up about Suno for forever is I think You can look at Suno as purely a creation service, right? Put it next to Sora and Midjourney and all these other ways of making stuff. And I think at this point If you want to make AI music, there are lots of ways that are not suuno to do that. Suno also seems to want to be a streaming service. Like it believes in some fundamental way that what you want to do is not only create music on Suno listen to music on Suno and that all of this is the new way that we think about and music is that it will be created by AI and listened to by you U guessing the musician in you It hates this reflexively, but I'm curious what you think about even sort of this thesis that Puno can be onene whole thought about how we make and experience music. I find that Dystopian just to be like the idea that you would make and listen to music on pseudo and that's your whole destination is I think antithetical to the idea of art in general would fundamentally destroy an entire industry. like if we want to like If you're making music and listening to your music on Suno That's Why do we have musicians? Why is there a music industry? Why do we have other streaming services Um That's like the the the very Broad argument against it, but I think Going back to this art thing, you know, I wrote a little bit about how nobody wants to tell me about why they listen to their own AI slop. A that came out. Some people did reach out to me and start to, you know, volunteer to offer some explanations. Give me a little flavor of the case people made for doing this It allows them crereate personal art It allows them to put their experience in song in a way they might not have been able to before For whatever reason that is. It's a story and an argument that sounds good at first brush. you know, it's hard to argue with something somebody saying like, well, it's my art. I didn't have a way to get it out there and it helps me or makes me feel heard, it allows me to exercise demons or whatever and you're like, well Yeah. I I have a hard time saying anything bad about that But I would argue that The point of art The point of art isn't to and the point of music isn't to necessarily allow you to exercise your demons for your own purposes. It's not about spitting your trauma back at you. It's about connecting you to other people. The reason you like the music you like is because that artist makes you feel seen because you relate to them It's about building empathy and connecting with other people. If you're dumping your diary entry into Suno about how you broke up with your girlfriend or you lost a parent and then you just like type a prompt along with it like sad country song or roock power ballad. I'd argue that it's an exercise in narcissism to a certain degree. and those people wouldn't want to say that. and I understand that they wouldn't like that and they probably get mad at me for saying this. What you're doing is you're making art for one You're not building connections And That's the whole point of art. I don't know. It seems it's a good distinction. and I think you're making me think back to when like Sora launched or when Meta decided that it was going to do a whole Facebook feed of just AI generated stuff. and I think I in general have kind of dismissive of most generative AI art things. like I think they're nifty novelties that don't actually accomplish very much for people. Everybody seems to like make one studio, Ghibli style piece of art and then move on with their lives. But there was something about we want to turn this into a community experience Vit Like it did. it felt dystopian to me. and it is like this is such a fundamental misread of what people actually want to experience with each other. and like Sora flamed out. Nobody goes to I don't even know if the Facebook AI feed still exists. like Proof continues to be that people do not want the experience that you're describing Yeah that actually There is something to making things for yourself, right? Vibe coding proves it, right? Like There are lots of people with specific creative needs for themselves knock yourself out This is why I'm so stuck on, I don't buy the idea of SunNo as a streaming service at all, because the things that you make for yourself, will never ever feel the same to anyone else because they just they just can't. And like every musician talks about this cool moment where you make something, and then you release it to the world and it now belongs to other people And it does seem to me that AI includes that just the way in which we make things with AI tools does not seem able in a way to make that kind of connection Absolutely. And I think, you know, digging around in like the SunNo sububreddit or hanging around in the Suno Discord, people talk a lot about the music they've made with SUuno and they share it. But nobody ever talks about listening to the AI music of other people all about what I've made, what I've released. and there is no Nobody wants to listen to the other AI slop people made. They just want to listen to their own. There is an interesting thing happening there, which is that all of that stuff being made is flooding streaming services. And even if you believe that most people don't want to listen to it. And it seems like statistically speaking this vast quantity of AI generated music accounts for a like teeny, tiny percentage of actual listening and that most of it is accidental or fraudulent in some way you still have a real problem in that all of a sudden, Actual artist's work is about to get harder to find and it's being buried in just an avalanche of this AI slop. Even if people don't want to listen to it as it comes on to streaming services, it is still going to cause huge problems for real artists, right Absolutely. I think, you know Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like there is a really easy solution there. U I mean, like from the user end, it seems like the easy solution is just we don't want it. so please take it away or at least or at least let us filter it out. I would You know ill for a button that just let me say, I don't want AI in my thing. so please just block it fully Dieser and Koba have systems in place that will identify and flag AI generated content But it doesn't remove it and it doesn't let you filter. It just puts a little label on it And that's, you know, thankfully they're doing some to like demonetize and keep it out of their algorithmic recommendations, which means people are going listen to it less. They won't put it in their curated playlists, but let's be fair, Dieszer and Kobas are smallm potatoes I mean, Spotify. and Apple Music are essentially the game And Spotify in particular seems potentially to be very excited about the idea of you and I listening to more AI generated music because it doesn't have to pay royalties It seems like a big victory for Spotify It does. And I think, you know, Spotify is Spotify is a weird case. againg, having been covering this and following it for a while now. in some respects Spotify is doing more than Apple clean up you know, the AI spam and AI generated content from its platform ll has seemed to have very little interest in addressing it at all Um, They've rolled out like a in system where you can label it as AI or using AI if you want to, but it's not actually quired and it doesn't change anything on the user end as far as I know. I think of those things as like pinky promise systems where it's like we would love it if you would tell us that this is made with AI Please be cool, everybody. And just it doesn't accomplish anything for anybody. And Spotify is doing something similar But at the same time also starting to roll out some more protections for artists themselves where they're They can require that uploaded music be manually approved before it hits their profile, which the fact that this wasn't a thing beforehand drives me insane. The fact that literally anybody could just go on and upload music to a random artist's profile essentially is bonkers U, So they are doing some work I would say Probably not enough, still They're doing something. But yes, they also, I think, are very excited about watering down the royalty distribution cool with a bunch of nonsense. Spotify has said as much that it is essentially happy to have music that is not made by and thus to people that like's they're very clear about that. I mean, you think about like Do you remember that whole curfuffle about all the money Spotify was paying white noise generators Yeah, and how that became a whole like Boy would Spotify love to just have all that be AI generated on Spotify and not have to pay anybody? Like It makes sense. the simple business case there, I understand for Spotify, it just leads down sort of inevitably gross weird roads Tomorrow morning is knocking. Stock your fridge now. How about a creamy moocha frappuccino drink, or a sweet vanilla? smmooth caramel maybe, or white chocolate mocha. Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits. Find Starbucks Frappuccino drinks wherever you buy your groceries What is happening? What am I seeing? This's not real L. That. Unexplainable, the show about everything we don't know He's coming to Netflix. 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Every episode we talk about what's wrong with our lives, our guests lives, the world But in a fun way. bottom line is you're gonna walk away feeling better about your life We've had so many cool guests, Caleb here on Bizzy Phillips, Stavros Helkias. Laverne Cox. Hassan Piker. Alana Glazer. I promise you're gonna have a good time. Now on the Vox Media podcast network. This is the downside. If I'm an artist right now, am I looking at Suno and tools like it as What amounts to a spam problem? like you're saying that maybe it'll bump me down search results. but Fundamentally the Spotifies and Apple musicics of the world. are going to try to fight this thing Or is this a real fundamental existential creative threat to my work and livelihood. I think it is a fundamental and existential threat to your creative livelihood as an artist I you know, they're, again, it's some of these things that sound good on paper essentially the entire music industry middle class because people will talk about how, well now they'll use Suno to generate demos of songs even, Maybe it's not what they're going to release. But rather than go to a studio and rent studio time, maybe rather than hire a session guitarist, maybe rather than work with a second songwriter They'll turn to Suno. This is a well known and well documented problem in Nashville But now those that guy who was making a living, perhaps doing the occasional studio session and playing in a honky Tonk in a bar band Well, he's just lost a significant source of income What does he do For the people who are at the top of the charts for your Beyon and your Taylor Swifts Suno at the end of the day is an annoyance because it is, let's be clear, stealing your music is it is ingesting it, scraping it and turnurning it into ones and zeroos for people to rearrange for their pleasure. You can make Suno generate a Beyonce song by saying artist rhymes with Smichmone. L you literally can just do it It It's just sitting there I mean, I mean, I've proven how broken their copyright filters are. There There's an article on the verge. You should go read it about how broken Suno's copyright filters are, in which there is a alarmingly accurate rendition of Beyonce's freedom. Um so You know, for them though, it is ultimately an annoyance more than anything else. And if you're at the bottom end, you are just playing shows at your local coffee shop because you like to play guitar and sing songs for your friends, it's not going to make a huge difference But that middle class, those people who are working horring musicians who make a living at it, mayaybe not a great living, but make a living at it. They're in real danger Let me tell you about this very specific version of this experience I've been having recently and You're not on TkTok I am not it Good for you. I am terminally on TikTok, and that's a real problem I I should preface all of this by saying this is all going to make me look Nerdy and embarrassing in a bunch of ways that I'm fully comfortable with and Do you know It's Goofy mov Yes. Okay. Do you know the song eye to eye from a Goofy movie Yes. I die one of the all time great Disney songs. shout out to Powerline fun. Thout Let's see, when did this come about a year ago Disney put out an album called A Who New Sound, which was basically a bunch of punk remixes of classic Disney songs. which is a sentence made for me specifically. It' like all of my favorite things all in one album. And the very first U single they put out was this group called Magnolia Park covering eye to eye. This song sort of had a moment. It went around. P people liked it. Magnolia Park kind of had aent on TikTok when this came out the album did pretty well. and then earlier this year cover of eye to eye starts going viral on TikTok. Let me just play you this cover right, Tarens, you want I guess we made this song I mean, that is AI, pseudo like it's the The moment the vocals kick in, you can tell. This is so so very AI on This song went Lightly viral in one of the most fascinating ways and I think I've seen with AI music all over social media, which is song comes out And there are two immediate responses in the comments. One of them is this rips put it on Spotify, I need to like inject this into my vans. And then under every single one of those comments is another comment saying, bro, it's AI It's AI And this one was really fascinating because every time you see this version An anywhere on TikTok, there will be hundreds of comments from people being like, why why did you post this and not the Magnolia Park version? That great that was by people question. It's And I love this because there are a bunch of people who are like the argument is not even necessarily that that version is better, even though it transparently is But it becomes this argument about human music versus AI music. Like let me just read you some of the comments on this video that I have here U And again, I picked this one complepletely at random. This is just a video that has this on Magnolia Park is actually a band. AI is taking over. There are many AI bands and songs and more popping up every day. Yes, it's good, however, an actual band will always be better And then there's a response that just says L take. It's very funny. You almost had me, but it being AI ruins everything Man, it sucks how many people are just lying to themselves saying this version is trash because it's AI. This version and Magnoli Parks version now exist. Just enjoy them both. Again, like peopleeople are just litigating AI and art in the comments section of every single one of these videos and over and over, there are also people who are like, I hate how much I like this. because It's AI I'm just curious how you feel about this whole. We've taken a Disney song We've turned it into something else made by people. and then we have just completely AIyed the hell out of that second thing someomewhere in that spectrum is either the absolute future of creativity or perfect representation of how all of this breaks For the life of me cannot figure out which one it actually is I mean, I think it's it's the latter. I think it's this is how this breaks U I mean, I think this is a perfect example of how, you know Magalia Park had this minor hit the album does fairly well, but Megalia Parks not playing Madison Square Garden This is the this is the sort of thing I'm talking about. This is that musical middle class where like This is now taking you know, money out of their pockets and they probably actually need this. This is a band that, again, let's be clear, Spotify doesn't pay you royalties unless you cross a c certain streaming threshold. It's watered down when you start doing this. And you know, there's royalties to be paid out from TikTok. and now this has gone viral instead of their version. they're losing out on that. We can argue whether or not the technical quality is there Does it sound good I would argue no right. You know, we can people can agree to disagree on certain things But at the end of the day It's just a machine spittning out code. It's not I don't care what your prompt is band had a connection to that song. Even if that connection was just as simple as I remember that movie from when I was a kid. I loved that shit. Sudo doesn't have a emotional connection to anything. It's I think it's Pying on people's nostalgia in a weird way that is kind of gross kind of cynical. like and I think that's the best thing you can say about it Yeah. I mean, it's interesting. And I think the more I think about this one in particular the more U, I think about the way distribution is changing all of this, right? Because there are a lot of people who are coming to this AI cover of I do I and being like, oh punk rock, goofy movie covers. this rules and There is there they're not finding better version of this that this is just ripping from, right? And I think It's it's a really strange thing and this goes back to like is this a spam problem or is this something more fundamental that like TikTok is how we discover music now. It just is. It has been for a long time. TikTok is how how music is discovered for like a generation of people and The fact that you can just abbsolutely flood the zone with every AI cover of every song you can possibly think of. does change the dynamic in a way that is going to make it vastly harder for anyone else to get through just because they can't make music as fast as Suno can. Absolutely And I think that this is one of the things that like when I talk about AI music with people who are maybe not even defenders of it, but just are the very least less vehemently anti than I am But is I think stuff like this presents as kind of innocuous. It seems like a harmless diversion And you know, I think there's a certain amount of it that does present as being primarily a spam problem But I think the moment you start digging a little bit deeper or the moment you start actually like examining it, it becomes clear that it's actually a lot more than that It is an existential threat It's not just that, oh, it's a little bit of a spam. it's like you're saying, you can flood it and drown everybody else out and that's threatening their livelihoods. This thing that might seem innocuous of, oh, I made punk rock cover of a thing by telling Suno, Well, there's an actual band that really did that and Now your're pushing them down you know, people's feeds with your AI nonsense And that's not to speak again, of the ethical implications of how we train AI, the environmental impacts of it. like just ignoring all of that stuff, which is incredibly heavy baggage to begin with The moment you start scratching beyond the, oh, it's harmless genre transfers, it's It's it's worse than that I tend to agree and I think The more the deeper down this well I have gone, the weirr it feels. to experience any kind of AI music. And in a lot of ways as it gets better Like you mentioned you can sort of tell immediately as soon as the vocals come in that it's AI That probably won't be true forever. And in a lot of ways, this whole thing gets more alarming as that is the case. I think there is a debate about Can AI make good music