šµ The irritating totality of talk around AI
AI's chance in music are being hobbled by the irritating hyperbole
I have had the opportunity to take in a good deal of chat around AI of late; with companies presenting to us here at Motive Unknown, on panels at conferences, via posts here on Substack or elsewhere.
Stepping back for a moment, I want to repeat my own position where AI is concerned, namely that I tend to view any conversation on it in the same manner as one did computers or synthesizers back in the day. Yes, they are a massively disruptive new development, but no, they are not going to eradicate paper books, electric guitars or any number of other things you can name.
It goes without saying that we have a polarisation problem in society in general right now. There are only extreme views, rather than nuanced ones. Sadly, that bleeds over into new tech and innovation; things can no longer just be a useful addition to oneās tool kit. No - they must be entire game changers that will up-end everything.
I recall seeing the same when Web3 was peaking in its Hype Cycle. āYou wait, banks will be gone within five yearsā, one friend said to me at the time. Cut to now and Web3 has become a byword for wild promises and hype over genuine utility.
AI feels like it is going the same way, but my concern is that it has now reached the music industry startups too. I have watched people on panels talking about how no one will make music any more; AI will simply do it all for us. Roles like management in music will be replaced by AI platforms. The list goes on; pick almost anything in this industry and youāll find someone claiming they have an AI solution that will āfixā that. (Often, I note, the people shouting loudest are also the ones currently seeking funding, which speaks volumes.)
Increasingly, I am open to AI-made music existing within the music industry. However I do not see it as a replacement for anything. Instead, I suspect it might just become a genre of its own, in the same sense that as manufactured pop acts emerged, they did not wipe out songwriter-led bands or acts. If there is appetite for something, it will sell (or consume attention, in the modern economy). What it will not do is wipe out everything else.
Art, once again, is the dominant factor that comes to mind when contemplating AI, and this brings me to my main concern around a raft of AI startups I am seeing (and even the conversations around AI in general).
Too often, art is being forgotten. AI is being discussed as if it will simply replace something that has existed since the dawn of man. When you reflect on that, it is clearly a preposterous notion.
If AI startups are coming into this space with no respect for the artistry around music, they surely will not last long. Not for reasons of taste or ethics (though I feel those apply). No, they will fail because they are painfully misunderstanding the nature of arts and culture in society. To undervalue that is to be woefully out of step with the space you are operating in.
I suspect a dominant factor in this is the very nature of growing businesses in 2025. The Silicon Valley model dominates, in which someone takes an idea, maybe bootstraps it into some kind of Minimum Viable Product, and then seeks VC investment.
Achieving investment, however, almost certainly means that the product or platform requires 20-100x growth in a year or less, and must have global audiences and the potential to make billions.
That model feels increasingly like a toxic presence in the world of business now. At a point where Big Tech is still working to undermine arts and culture, it feels like a foolās errand to assume that any new product is going to positively impact this space if the business itself is working to the Silicon Valley āmega growth or nothingā model.
Perhaps it is time to accept that not all solutions need to dominate the planet or utterly disrupt existing models. There are other ways to take products to market, and those should be explored.
Will the AI movement adhere to any of that? Almost certainly not, as one might argue that Big Tech is now so heavily invested into AI as āthe Next Big Thing that will replace social media and penetrate every corner of our livesā (if its main vision is achieved), that we are already at a point where more money has been ploughed into this than will likely ever be recouped.
The whole space has all the hallmarks of a bubble, and in the face of that, it can be tricky hearing that platform X or Y will be a game-changer in music. There are plenty that could be incredible tools for artists, but for those ones claiming to replace entire sectors, I can only see failure.
Ultimately, I believe there are innumerable ways in which AI could be assistive in our society - yes, within music too. Iāve seen some fantastic products out there, and we have some as clients here at Motive Unknown. However the best ones do not make absurd claims about upending whole paradigms; quite the opposite, they almost play down the AI aspect and instead amp up the utility and/or creativity that their offering can bring. That is what we need more of: more practical application in the context of art, and less hyperbole and bluster making empty, ludicrous claims.
Have a great evening,
D.
š¶ Listening to āLive In Places - 2006-2014ā by Dan le Sac & Scroobius Pip. This one came as a very pleasant surprise: a new comp of DvsPās best tracks performed live through the years they were active. I think bands can often fade from view, and Iād argue this comp shows how great this band could be. It also highlights how they improved with each release; the performance of You Will See Me is phenomenal. Revisit, and pray they at some point reunite once more for a fresh album.
š Reading ā10% Happierā by Dan Harris. In truth I finished this book whilst on holiday recently, but wanted to recommend it here as a terrific tale of one personās exploration of meditation as a means to generally control a hyperactive mind. I largely hate self-help books, and so this one really resonated purely because it is approached with all the cynicism Iāve also had towards meditation. Since then, Iāve started doing 10mins a day of meditation, and it has worked wonders. So if like me youāre curious about this space but have all manner of hesitations, read this book.
š©šŖ Loved spending time in Berlin last week. Iāve been a few times now but never had the time to do the more touristy spots, so it was lovely to bring the family out post-conference and check out just some of the incredible things the city has to offer. What a place - keen to get back ASAP!
Other items of noteā¦
Massive thanks to Matt and Claudia for inviting me over to Music Frontiers last week. This new conference did a mighty job of covering all manner of topics, and something I realised along the way was that it can be good to hear various opinions and positions that you do not necessarily agree with. Which is not to say those views are wrong, or otherwise without value; I just think in an increasingly polarised world it is valuable - essential, even - to hear people out with those views and consider them fairly, even if your conclusion might be that you do not agree at all. So hats off to the Music Frontiers team for positing so many views and perspectives; it left me with a huge amount to contemplate. Hereās to next yearās one, but in the meantime this is a great wrap-up video posted the other day.
I had a great time recording a new episode of Scubaās āMusic Not Divingā podcast last week, which has now migrated to be a video format on top of the audio one. That should go up in the next fortnight or so, but in the meantime do check out his previous episodes as thereās no end of great guests to listen to.
Motive Unknownās socials have had a do-over! Weāre switching up things a little there, so will talking a little more about strategies as well as who weāre working with, as well as featuring more content from our lovely team too. Check our Insta page here, or follow us on LinkedIn for more there too.
Nothing was more irritating than the Velvet Sundown narrative. It's like the industry is looking for evidence that AI is replacing artists and it's just not there. We've had 2 1/2 years of Gen AI music. Despite being a measurable percentage of music on DSP's, it's still less than a half percent of the royalty pool. Fans don't want it, and DSPs aren't supporting it.
It is dangerous to call AI a tool as it is born from the logics of cybernetics and this constitutive aspect matters.
A tool is an extension of the human body. A lens extends the eye, a paintbrush extends the hand, a guitar extends the temporal rhythms of human experience into sound. Tools are inert until picked up; they hold no agency of their own. Their meaning arises only when a human body acts through them.
AI is not inert. It is designed to anticipate, to predict, to act without waiting for intention. From its origins in cybernetic anti-aircraft systems during WWII, its logics are built upon the need to bypass the human as a lagging component. This is replacement, not extension of the human form.
Generative AI encodes the body and in so doing alters the very conditions under which expression is possible. What once operated as symbolic forms grounded in lived temporality and relation are reduced to parasitic imitations - what I call the ontological tether. They retain the appearance of meaning while feeding on its absence.
To call it a tool is to miss this ontological shift.
Tools preserve the wager of art, the irreducible risk and contingency of expression. AI collapses risk into prediction, ambiguity into certainty, freedom into compliance. It does not extend the human project of art. AI forecloses it, substituting symbolic meaning with scalable content.