"When you listen to a song like this, what you're actually listening for are the disruptions. You're listening for the burr on the voice. You're listening for the syllables where the singer just kind of yanks back or doubles down and hits the accelerator. What you get in this song, though, is something that's incredibly smooth, incredibly flat, no emotional microvariations."
"I still hear your voice. It doesn't surprise me that this first generation of A.I. hits is really focused on emotional manipulation. If you listen to this Solomon Ray song, you listen to Xania Monet's How Was I Supposed to Know. If you listen to Breaking Rust's Walk My Walk. These are all songs that appeal to the downtrodden, and I think for people looking for songs to validate those feelings, it might matter less if the performers of those songs are real or fake."
A.I.-generated hits often lack vocal microvariations, producing an incredibly smooth, flat sound without the emotional burrs and disruptions of human singers. Early A.I. pop tracks tend to target downtrodden or vulnerable listeners, validating sadness through formulaic phrasing and emotional manipulation. Many synthetic songs mimic Southern, churchy gospel and Black soul aesthetics, raising questions about training data, consent, and whether Black creators participated. Listeners cannot know who trained the models or what source material informed them. The trend prompts ethical concerns about cultural extraction, authenticity, and the commodification of grief.
Read at www.nytimes.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]