Ask HN: How long till we get a pop song hit fully generated and performed by AI?
I predict that in the next 3 years, we will have a song in the top charts that is written, composed, and (deep-faked) performed all via AI. Thoughts? Chart toppers are mostly made by the labels. Sure the musicians/performers make the music, but the companies with the plarform/connections are the ones that push things to that level. I see this going 1 of 2 ways. The big wigs cut out the musicians for more money by using AI. Or, they suppress AI content because they don't like the business model (people don't just listen to the music, they tend to be more interested in the human element, eg concerts or royalties in other media are where the money is made). > written, composed, and (deep-faked) performed Ok, so : 1- Written : ChatGPT already spits out pop-hit-ready lyrics (not a high bar...) 2- Composed : AI results are, by definition, perfectly attuned to our tastes. Plus pop melodies are the easiest. So if you curate a good one out off, say, 1000 random (midi) generations, you can compose a Hit with it 3- Performed : Videos are more difficult that images, but we are already conditionned to CGI + VFX heavy music videos (even low-prod ones). So I don't think it is difficult to generate an AI powered ("collage" style) deep-faked music video. It is not over though. You did not mention if the sound is totally AI generated or if humains arrange/produce and play/sing in it. As you can glimpse from the openAI jukebox [1], IMO it is convincingly generating these two elements with the three others into a coherent (less hallucinatory) whole that may be real difficult. A lot of innovation in music AI is currently happening at HarmonAI, a group within Stability AI. My guess is they will soon release some sort of "Jukebox 2.0" model. > if you curate a good one wow, didn't expect A&R to be the only part that couldn't be automated There are already AI based Analytics Services used by labels/A&R. However, they analyse how tracks are already performing (= their emergence) to gauge the artists future success. Melody pre-analysis is not a big part of that (to my knowledge). To return to my reply, I suppose you can use a second level AI to rate that first-level 1000 generated melodies, instead of manually curating THE ONE. I don't rule that out. Will it be more successful than a human-in-the-loop process? Maybe one day. Maybe as a novelty song or part of a larger context (like theme song to a cartoon or movie or tv show). But as a standalone product I think it'll take longer, maybe 10 years. We'll see Ai assisted stuff first before we see the whole kit and caboodle.