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HellsBelle @sh.itjust.works

How can you tell if music is AI-generated?

A survey published last week suggested 97% of respondents could not spot an AI-generated song. But there are some telltale signs - if you know where to look.

Here's a quick guide ...

  • No live performances or social media presence
  • 'A mashup of rock hits in a blender'

A song with a formulaic feel - sweet but without much substance or emotional weight - can be a sign of AI, says the musician and technology speaker, as well as vocals that feel breathless.

  • 'AI hasn't felt heartbreak yet'

"AI hasn't felt heartbreak yet... It knows patterns," he explains. "What makes music human is not just sound but the stories behind it."

  • Steps toward transparency

In January, the streaming platform Deezer launched an AI detection tool, followed this summer by a system which tags AI-generated music.

183 comments

  • I was looking for videogame remixes one day and found a channel doing Little Nemo from the NES. I used to love that game and thought it was an odd pick for remixes, one you don't see too often so I clicked on it and ... it was incredibly underwhelming. I listened for a few minutes and something was kind of off but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. It was AI of course.

    I'm not much of a music person, I've been listening to it daily for my entire life but I don't know much about theory. Still, when it comes to remixes, you can usually tell why someone remixed a song. They like that particular song, or there's a motif that really struck them. They'll pick out certain sounds or elements and build on them, single them out and rearrange them. It's very intentional and you can tell.

    AI-generated remixes lack this intentionality. It was like someone had twisted a dial that just said "complexity" and that was it. There were more intricate layers of beats and instrumentation on top, but it wasn't doing anything. I sat there and listened for 15 minutes and it was like I heard nothing. Nothing new stuck in my head, there was no riff or little melody that made go, "Aw fuck yeah! This is what it's about!"

    That's how you can tell AI generated music.

    Sadly, a lot of slower and minimalist genres have been decimated by it though. Vaporwave, chillcore, dungeonsynth. A lot of these had large bodies of work to train on and it's a lot harder to tell due to their subtler nature, but you'll usually notice the artist has a new hour-long upload every day. If you click through it at random, you'll begin to notice that while the tones shift, the overall pattern of the entire hour-long mix is still kind of the same?

    It's bleak, man. Fuck that shit.

    • This is kind of irrelevant to the argument, but if I were to provide you with a mix of AI and organically produced music, would you be able to pick them out every time?

      It's a bit like Andy Warhol's "Brillo box" art installation. Is it just a Brillo box he got at the store? Or did he make it himself, thereby creating "art"? Could you know the difference? Would you?

      As a fun aside, a permanent exhibition of one of "his" Brillo boxes turned out to be fake (well, real, if you think about it, which is kind of the point of that piece of Warhol's art), and there was a huge investigation into who had taken the "original", but people had been coming and seen the exhibition for decades at that point, not knowing it was actually just a Brillo box.

      I think this touches on the complexity of the issues presented by AI that is actually a pretty ancient philosophical debate around art, meaning, and value.

      • This is kind of irrelevant to the argument, but if I were to provide you with a mix of AI and organically produced music, would you be able to pick them out every time?

        I'd like to think much more often than not, yes. People talk about it being able to replicate low level pop and ... fine. But that's not really the kind of stuff I listen to. Maybe there's a statement to be made there about how far down pop has fallen that it can be mistaken with formulaic AI slop ...

        It’s a bit like Andy Warhol’s “Brillo box” art installation. Is it just a Brillo box he got at the store? Or did he make it himself, thereby creating “art”? Could you know the difference? Would you?

        Which I guess is what your point here is. What is art and who is the arbiter of that?

        Kind of different circumstances as I see it, though. Andy Warhol still performed the art of the Brillo box. He took something basic and skillfully crafted it into art to prod the artistic community into considering what we think of as art and why. It was in no way a trick but a very deliberate and intentional statement, or question even.

        AI on the other hand often feels like a trick. There is little to no intention, no human craft, and an effort to pass it off as a higher form of art than it really is. It's not asking questions or making statements but an effort to deliver "content" to fill some need. The need for more content.

        But like, hey. That's just my opinion, maaan ...

  • I'm in the camp of, "if it's good, why should I care?" However, I'm all for transparency! Passing off AI-generated music as human-generated is fraud. Be honest!

    There's a LOT of grey areas though. If you're a vocalist and you're using an AI-generated background? How's that any different from pressing "play" on a sequencer or even an audio file (of some sequenced or drum track)?

    If you're a lyricist, the actual music isn't as important as the lyrics. Does it matter if they used AI to generate the music or should every lyricist be forced to pay someone to make the music for them or master an instrument (or sequencer)?

    What if you're trying to translate your music into a different language and use AI to translate it? Is that AI-generated music? You can give your whole damned song to AI and it'll convert to a different language in-place without having to re-record it. It even uses your singer's voice!

    To me, it's incredible technology and it's enabling artists of all kinds to do cool things with their music. It seems rather paternalistic to suggest someone's creativity doesn't "count" if they didn't sweat or spend years practicing to create it.

    • You must consider that the AI "helping" the artist is built from the stolen work of countless artists. Regardless of use case, the tool only exists due to theft. Plus, this tool exists as a way to not pay talent for content.

      Since the bread and circuses machine must keep dispensing to keep the masses anaesthetized, the elites need a way to cut the costs or they will lose points are their net worth scorecard and get made fun of by the other billionaires.

      Not to mention, AI is a shortcut that does not generate skills besides prompt engineering. We have research proving this with students and the labor force losing reasoning and straight memory by handing off to "AI". Part of being a musician is the effort and practice and knowing an instrument. Asking the clanker for a tune because learning takes too long or is too difficult goes along with what the article says for detecting it. The work will be emotionless and have no soul. Musicians are allowed to make choices for their music, of course. AI rounding out an artist's tools is what it is. I view the tool as a corrupting force but, it's their perogative. But people without no knowledge or skill for making music cranking out these generic sounding similacra to make money is always going to set my teeth on edge.

      Edit: spelling and tense correction. Revision and expansion of idea to express less derision.

      • You must consider that the AI “helping” the artist is built from the stolen work of countless artists.

        I feel like this is conflating two separate arguments.

        Is AI music good, versus is AI music moral.

  • My first experience with AI music was when I was on my usual 90s hip-hop/rap vibe and got recommended some channels with alleged underground hits. There definitely were a couple channels that put out legit mixes that did have a lot of music and artists I didn't know prior, but one of the mixes was weird. I could tell immediately, less than a minute in, mainly because of the vocals that sounded super generic as well kind of robotic in addition to a very out of place beat that doesn't sound at all like it'd belong in the 90s/2000s era of rap music. Had it not been for the vocals in tandem with the mismatched beat (obviously created by someone who doesn't know jack about the music genre and the ear it's supposed to represent), I might not have spotted the AI involved.

    The scary and sad part is that I doubt YouTube will do anything about it despite reports and that there are so many people that either don't care or don't know/realise. Only saw like one or two other comments calling out that mix having been made with AI

  • AI imitates an overall sound. But doesn't care much about "instruments" individually. For simple minimal segments it can easily lay down a simple clear beat or melody. But as more gets added. The more the sound becomes muddy and generic. That and if you're familiar enough with a given instrument. It can often just sound "wrong". Again because the AI is imitating a sound, not an instrument generally.

    But yeah. The other points stand. Social media presence and output are great indicators.

    Midnight Darkwave is one I'm highly suspicious of. Super generic name. Not much presence beyond the streaming sites. I like the overall sound, but it often gets muddy and kind of droning. And not in the coldwave sort of way. Something a bit more inhuman, over processed, and mechanical.

    • I can see a creative use for Suno Studio where you can feed it a clip of a chord progression you recorded, have the AI generate a few extrapolations, then arrange bits and pieces of it within Suno Studio to create the basic song structure and finally export the midi to your DAW. Basically, you can use it as a fancy sketchpad.

      The problem I can't get past is the environmental impact.

      • Absolutely, AI is just a tool. It can be used for good things and for bad things. And there are technologies currently being worked on outside the circle jerk Ponzi scheme of all the tech oligarchs right now to make it less environmentally impactful. They just don't care and are rushing to make every last buck they can before the bubble pops.

      • Right? I used to use... Don't remember what the app was on Android, but it was like a fun little beat studio, it could generate random patterns according to styles, and randomize instruments too. So you'd get a loop, then you'd tweak it and switch our instruments and sounds and whatnot, and then when I found a nice rhythm, I recreated it in Ableton or FL Studio or whatever.

        So, let's say you use Suno to make a good beat. You import slice and dissect the beat and sounds, and I fail to see how it's qualitatively any different than using sample or loop packs, which basically every fucking musician on the planet does.

        "Are we so different, you and I"? :)

    • I have used Suno quite extensively just for fun, I insert my own lyrics and let it create different styles and beats, and you have to push out like 30 before it does something actually decent, but some of them are fucking bangers. I consider it like watching visualizations in WinAmp.

      I am not stating a moral proposition in either direction, just an observation.

      • I like to ask it to generate lyrics based on funny prompts. For example, I asked it to write a song from Darth Vader's perspective about the fact that he never actually said "Luke, I am your father". The results was just savage.

        Hey Luke
        \ I heard you kissed your sister on Hoth
        \ I'm not mad
        \ I'm just curious
        \ 'Cause I never kissed mine
        \ Did you like it? Did she like it?
        \ Do you regret it? Do you feel gross?
        \ Did it feel weird when she kissed you?
        \ I know that you never kissed before

        She got a man (Ooh)
        \ You got a hand (Ooh)
        \ And maybe you should stick to what you know
        \ Oh
        \ You need to know\

        I am your father (I am your father)
        \ Luke
        \ I am your father (Luke, I am your father)
        \ No
        \ I never said that
        \ I never said that (No, I never said that)
        \ No

  • Bullshit. This only applies to fully prompt generated AI music. Tracks that heavily rely on AI based tech as a part of the process are harder to catch, and tracks that only use AI for mixing and mastering are impossible to detect.

    I made a track but used AI to autotune and morph my voice to that of a woman's. It even allowed me to tweak the expressiveness of the voice. The track is 95% human made but the vocals are AI modified. I'm willing to bet that the ration of AI use in a lot of pop music and EDM is a lot higher.

    PS: I make music for myself, as a hobby. I just wanted to make something to share with my friends. If you want real music, try bands like Wet Leg, IDLES, GEESE, etc who lean into making low tech music.

    EDIT: Thia is an example of a song that is fully generated by AI. All that was fed to the prompt were the lyrics. The AI did everything else itself, including picking the genre. I shared it with a few people to see who'd figure out it was AI slop.

    https://youtu.be/oOJ0En2u5DQ

  • Frequency.

    A couple months ago, I found a really cool remake of one of the songs from KPop Demon Hunters. Everyone was doing covers of those songs, and many of them were indie artists, and I was rolling through them. So I found this video, and the video was just an image effect on the cover, which looked very AI-generated, but it's just the cover image, right? Who cares about that? I asked them in the comments if they would release their stuff on Apple Music. And they quickly responded — no, they're going to leave that money on the table, and have decided to stay exclusive to YouTube. Why would an artist choose to do that? Sure, a couple artists pulled their music off all other streaming platforms when they made their own, or their friends did. Garth Brooks has never been on streaming (except Amazon, I think they're the only one whose ethics he agrees with or something?). But most indie artists are on all the platforms. Maximise revenue. So these people saying no, not only to Apple Music — maybe they didn't like Apple kissing up to Trump — but also to Spotify, Amazon, Deezer, and all the rest. Turns out most of those platforms are stricter when it comes to AI music.

    But here's the thing — their songs are still by the original artist. They're just stripping out the lyrics and putting new music to the lyrics. And that music is AI generated. Or so I later learned. I looked more into the YouTube channel, and they say they will make you a cover of a song, in any style you like, for $200. And they have hundreds of uploads... in a few months. Each song may have five or six variants. And the songs are still fine, but they have a generic, plastic, not real feel to them.

    Of course, they also qualify the first thing in OP's summary, no social media presence. They just have the sales site, and the YouTube channel.

    But maybe it's fine, or at least less bad, that they're taking existing songs and just remixing them with AI? Only they're saying the covers are better, and they're monetising the videos, so they're getting paid for the streams when that money should be going to the original artist. It's fine if they actually covered the song and recorded it, but having a computer do all the heavy lifting? Just seems scummy.

    I'm not going to name & shame, but if you look up KPDH covers and see something that looks like AI slop with click-bait titles... you've probably found the right one. (They cover other stuff too, not just KPDH.)

  • Generally it is incredibly bland even blander than regular mainstream music.

  • Maybe people with be more protective of their art from here on out and stop trying to make a mill off of clout.

    We gave the tech companies or data. We are reaping the consequences.

  • idk they are different and both good. right now im listening to my own manually composed music because the long complex note structure actually has meaning and is pretty. Sometimes I listen to my ai songs because they can be pretty in their own way too, especially my fey song and my necromancer one where her voice does a superinteresting highly emotional energetic thing i would never have dreamed to put in one of my own songs. Also sometimes I like playing music on piano or viola. There are many types of music. I like alot of them :)

  • Look, I hate AI as much as the next person, but honestly, I think a lot of AI music is better than whatever dumb shit they play on radio literally all across the world.

    Text AI is meh.

    Image AI is meh.

    Video AI is not bad.

    Music AI is pretty good.

    Edit: Wow, tough crowd, tough crowd. I stand by what I said.

    • Hasn't been existed since forever like hatuni miku or teto

      • Vocaloids aren't AI, they're digital instruments.

      • I am not sure I quite follow. I mean yeah good comparison with Hatsune Miku, but I mean it genuinely- I would rather listen to some AI generated beats I "made" "myself" over the absolute auditive brain diarrhea they play in coffee shops all around the world, it's the same lowest common denominator manufactured pop drivel that I can't escape from one side of the planet to the other.

        Thanks, I'll take random techno beats with Bach fugues and Chopin leads with a Rasta rhythm over that any day. At least it doesn't desperately try to make a case for itself being great art.

    • Look, you obviously don't hate AI as much as the next person.

      • I hate the fact that it is owned and controlled and developed and manipulated by modern self made kings. I hate the fact that it has tremendous destructive power. I hate the fact that it will be used to control global discourse, empower militaries, and only serve to solidify the profound wealth gap already ingrained in and promoted by the fabric of our economic system.

        But hey, if you feel like you need to gatekeep hating AI, knock yourself out, I guess I will never achieve your level of purity.

    • Who the fuck is listening to the radio when they own a phone?

        1. A LOT of people, especially blue collar folk, listen to fully advertised radio schlock every single minute of their working day, and they work very long days.
        2. WiFi is technically radio.
        3. Neither 1) nor 2) matters, because the word "radio" encompasses a fuzzy category of media content regardless of how it's being provided. People still go to the "movies" even though we've had "talkies" since 1910. We still watch film even when it's shot digitally.
183 comments