ILĀ - murmur with ai.mogen (Relative State)

AI is infiltrating the creative and cultural worlds at a rate of knots, mostly for the worse at present. The genie is out of the bottle and I'm currently sitting on the fence, not too concerned and watching with interest.

There are currently two ends of the musical AI spectrum. The first are the simple to use, actually pretty impressive AI music generators like Suno and Udio. Type in a prompt and shortly after out pops some listenable music, albeit of poor sound quality. Unsurprisingly it more often than not sounds pretty generic, if not downright familiar. Also unsurprisingly the app developers are currently in hot water with the record labels for training their apps on their copyrighted music without permission.

At the other end of the spectrum are the musical vanguard who aren't short on creativity and who are curiously using all sorts of AI tools - not just word to music apps, in creative ways to harness their imagination and express themselves. ILĀ and ai.mogen - the machine assisted alter ego of the ever progressive Imogen Heap are but two. Holly Herndon, ARCA and Grimes some other cutting edge notables doing some good work.

I can't pretend to understand the production technicalities of what they're doing, I'm just here to vibe off the recorded output, but here's a bit of info from the press release:

Blending advanced AI vocal timbre transfer tools, this single sees ILĀ and Imogen Heap swap the qualities of their voices to craft a uniquely otherworldly sound. The AI tools used include DDSP models of ILĀ and Imogen’s voices trained by artist Portrait XO. This process is part of the ongoing development of ai.mogen - a persona representing all AI-generated manifestations of Imogen Heap’s likeness, with her oversight and approval. 

So what of the music? First off you'll have to be pop attuned, which normally I'm not but when it's as futuristic and well fashioned as this I'm down. Seemingly deep space emanating electronic sounds get the ball rolling, soon to be joined by a repurposed rave bassline - the perfect foil for the effected voices to float over. Anything resembling a traditional hook is eschewed, technoid repetition and futurism is the order of the day. There's nothing obviously AI that jumps out at you - whatever "obviously AI" sounds like, but it's certainly an accomplished slice of futuristic pop with a zeitgeisty creation story, and a fine advert for the creative possibilities of AI music.

The AI future is now so don't bury your head in the sand, but I'd strongly advise ignoring the half arsed copycats and hype merchants, and digging out the more creative and cutting edge artists if you're after inspiration rather than exasperation.