If AI replaces musicians, does the entire plugin industry die with them?

[guitarzan]

All pre-vice.

Yes, I liked his pre-Miami Vice stuff best too — but the Miami Vice stuff that he used Algorithmic Composer for was actually the stuff that really made him famous, or at least widely known to the public at large.

[Zeisner]

What a pompous ass. It looks like a mod deleted a bunch of stuff.

Who? Him or me?

[guitarzan]

Coincidentally, Dr. T (developer of Algorithmic Composer, Tonesmith, etc) just received the
MIDI Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2026 NAMM Show:

EMILE TOBENFELD, DR. T’S MUSIC SOFTWARE, AND THE FRONTIERS OF ALGORITHMIC CREATIVITY

As the MIDI community celebrates the 2026 NAMM Show, The MIDI Association proudly recognizes Emile Tobenfeld, better known to musicians around the world as “Dr. T,” with a MIDI Lifetime Achievement Award. Tobenfeld’s groundbreaking work in the 1980s and early 1990s profoundly shaped the creative possibilities of computer-based music making. Through Dr. T’s Music Software, he provided tools that were radically ahead of their time—sequencers, algorithmic composition systems, real-time performance environments, and editors that expanded how artists thought about composition and live interaction…
https://midi.org/emile-tobenfeld-dr-ts- ... creativity

[BONES]

I think we'll just disagree on that point. I could never see prompting a music generating machine as being a creative process.

Which, I assume, means you've never actually tried it. Which means you have no idea what you're talking about. There are plenty of people who can't see clicking in a piano roll with a mouse as being a creative process but that hasn't stopped me from releasing 7 well reviewed albums in the last 22 years.

That's like saying that prompting an autonomous car is an experience of driving.

Driving is a physical experience, it's a completely different thing. An autonomous car is more like using a sequencer instead of playing a part yourself, which is another thing we do a lot of around here.

Instead of drawing upon your own experiences, skills, and limitations to create something,

If you think there is no skill involved in prompting an AI, try it for yourself. My bandmate can do incredible things with Tunee, things you and I could never hope to accomplish. I don't have the patience for it myself but what my bandmate can get out of it nothing short of incredible.

you're bypassing all that by flipping preference switches in a machine, to have it created for you according to a machine's approximated amalgamation of other people's creativity.

How is that any different to any other creative process? Picasso famously said "good artists borrow, great artists steal". We are all inspired by the music we hear, it has a huge influence on what we create. If you think otherwise, you're deluding yourself.

The last 20 years of music from the music industry has been a giant snooze fest. Not that there haven't been some interesting exceptions along the way, but compared to the 20 years before that, or the 20 years before that, it's a drop in the bucket.

That's how it's been for most of the last 100 years, with a few exceptional years in the late 70s and early 80s. Of course, there are always artists who buck the trend but, for the most part, mainstream music is as boring as batshit and always has been.

One of the most exciting things back in the day was to buy an album and to watch the cover and to read the lyrics and who participated (mixing engineer, drummer, background singer etc) or at what studio it was recorded or sometimes even what instruments were used.. I know these days are gone and it is a new era of music mass production.

Liner notes are useful for finding other music you might also like but most good producers will have presided over as much garbage as gold. John fryer and Blackwing Studios were ones I used to look out for and there's not a lot I found that wasn't worth having but that stands out in my mind as an exception, rather than the rule. Mike Howlett was another one who produced a lot of albums in the early 80s that I liked but he also produced a lot of utter trash. I'd always listen to something he'd produced but I wouldn't always like it.

I found an excellent digital replacement for album artwork and liner notes. Microsoft's Zune ecosystem was the closest I've ever got to that old school experience. When you loaded music onto a Zune player, it would download bio's and photos of the artists and reviews of the albums. I had the media dock for my ZuneHD and I hooked it up to my TV so I could pore over that stuff while I listened to the album, or just watch the screensaver it would create on the fly for the artist/album. It also had a really good "related artists" feature, through which I discovered quite a lot of music I hadn't previously known about. Of course, Microsoft pulled the plug on it all just as music streaming was taking off but I still have my ZuneHD and I still use it regularly. In fact, right now I am listening to the new Fischer Z album through the Zune player on my PC.

These days Discogs is a good replacement for sleeve notes. It's the first place I go to find out about an album or artist but it's always as a tool for finding more music.

I agree, who knows what Stevie would do today as a teen. The root of future teens obviously will be AI whether one likes it or not.

Why? DAWs will still be around, so will sheet music and guitars and pianos and all those things. Using AI will be a choice, it won't become compulsory.

I am starting to wonder why humans still have relations or communicate, one could just buy an ai robot and ask every question ai

Robots cost money, people are cheap (but you get what you pay for).

With AI you miss the journey. The journey is all the fun, not the end result. Each to their own.

It's a different journey, that's all. I don't enjoy doing things the old way, I never really have. I don't like to just f**k around, I prefer to have something to work on. My bandmate is the other way around - he likes to f**k around but is less interested in trying to finish things. So he has most of the ideas and I turn them into songs and that way we both get to have our creative input.

[BONES]

The journey is not fun for everyone. Just read Bones' comments about how tedious everything is, how everything is a chore to him. There's a lot of people out there like him who hate making music but want to be musicians

I never wanted to be a musician but it was once a necessity if I wanted to do anything. These days I don't have to play anything if I don't want to, so mostly I don't. I think most musicians are wankers. Any musicianship I possess is almost irrelevant to what I/we do.

Absolutely. It's simply fascinating to push boundaries and discover new possibilities, resulting in a music and sound not heard before.

Don't make me laugh! Anything worth doing has been done aa hundred times over by better people than you or I. If you've come up with something "never heard before", it's almost certainly because it's not worth listening to. The sheer f**king arrogance of the thought takes my breath away.

I can't imagine how boring it must be to just slap a few presets, sample libraries and MIDI packs together - or in this case, let AI generate everything for you. There is no sense of achievement, no inspiration, no progress to be found. And no individuality and identity either.

My life is not so sad and empty that I require a sense of achievement to make myself feel good or valued or whatever it is that's missing in your life. I make music because it seems a natural extension of my love of music. It's not about me, never has been, it's always been about the music. That seems to be a really difficult concept for you self-centred tossers.

[Tubeman]

Happy to say that I found a mirror of Tim's Atari MIDI World site — So the generative software that Jan Hammer used quite extensively for a time was called Algorithmic Composer, running on a Commodore 64. This software then evolved into Tunesmith for Atari (which is now freeware and will run on the Steem Atari emulator!):

Just a little background on Tunesmith. It came out at the time when algorithmic programs were the "big thing"..late 80's. Actually Dr T kicked it off with the "Algorithmic Composer" package for the Commadore 64. A Certain Jan Hammer found out about it and had to purchase a Commadore 64 system to put next to his $30,000 Fairlite just to run Algorithmic Composer! He used it on his Miami Vice scores. Then Jim Johnson, the Author, decided to upgrade his ideas and the result was Tunesmith for the Atari.

That quote seems like a bunch of AI nonsense. A "Fairlite"?

[guitarzan]

Happy to say that I found a mirror of Tim's Atari MIDI World site — So the generative software that Jan Hammer used quite extensively for a time was called Algorithmic Composer, running on a Commodore 64. This software then evolved into Tunesmith for Atari (which is now freeware and will run on the Steem Atari emulator!):

Just a little background on Tunesmith. It came out at the time when algorithmic programs were the "big thing"..late 80's. Actually Dr T kicked it off with the "Algorithmic Composer" package for the Commadore 64. A Certain Jan Hammer found out about it and had to purchase a Commadore 64 system to put next to his $30,000 Fairlite just to run Algorithmic Composer! He used it on his Miami Vice scores. Then Jim Johnson, the Author, decided to upgrade his ideas and the result was Tunesmith for the Atari.

That quote seems like a bunch of AI nonsense. A "Fairlite"?

Tim Conrardy died in 2009, so his site, which I copied that text from, had nothing to do with AI — it’s a typo Sherlock, a mistake which AI probably wouldn’t make. Fairlight:

IMG_0909.jpeg

[BONES]

You know what I find most hilarious about this thread? You're wanking on about "creativity" like it was something you actually possessed. Well, where is it? Where's all this creative output that seems to be so f**king central to your sad, little lives? Seriously, where is it? Are you all so f**king busy propping up your wobbly, fragile egos that you don't have to time to actually do anything? I've gone back 10 pages in this thread and only found two other posters with links to their creative output. What the f**k do the rest of you get up to? Is it possible that you "creativity" is so limited, so poor that you're embarrassed to share?

Meanwhile, we actually do stuff. Our last 4 albums have been Top 5 in the only chart that matters in our genre, and we've had singles in various DJ charts alongside artists like Red Hot Chili Peppers and even Taylor Swift. What have any of you ever actually achieved? So maybe think about that for a minute before you start accusing people of cheating or taking shortcuts or not doing things the right way.

You could at least try to be a little less pathetic.

[vurt]

ive got tons of "stuff" dunno if i have links though?
id only do that if i was looking actively for listeners?

[Tubeman]

Happy to say that I found a mirror of Tim's Atari MIDI World site — So the generative software that Jan Hammer used quite extensively for a time was called Algorithmic Composer, running on a Commodore 64. This software then evolved into Tunesmith for Atari (which is now freeware and will run on the Steem Atari emulator!):

Just a little background on Tunesmith. It came out at the time when algorithmic programs were the "big thing"..late 80's. Actually Dr T kicked it off with the "Algorithmic Composer" package for the Commadore 64. A Certain Jan Hammer found out about it and had to purchase a Commadore 64 system to put next to his $30,000 Fairlite just to run Algorithmic Composer! He used it on his Miami Vice scores. Then Jim Johnson, the Author, decided to upgrade his ideas and the result was Tunesmith for the Atari.

That quote seems like a bunch of AI nonsense. A "Fairlite"?

Tim Conrardy died in 2009, so his site, which I copied that text from, had nothing to do with AI — it’s a typo Sherlock, a mistake which AI probably wouldn’t make. Fairlight:

IMG_0909.jpeg

Yes, I'm aware what a Fairlight is and I was aware in the 80s that Jan Hammer used it. Nothing to do with AI though.

[Tubeman]

ive got tons of "stuff" dunno if i have links though?
id only do that if i was looking actively for listeners?

I think you should start by listing your computer and operating system and how much RAM it has and then other gear and plugins in your signature.

[guitarzan]

Yes, I'm aware what a Fairlight is and I was aware in the 80s that Jan Hammer used it. Nothing to do with AI though.

He used Dr. T’s Algorithmic Composer software on a Commodore 64 with his Fairlight to do the Miami Vice stuff.

Dr. T has just been awarded the The 2026 MIDI Association Lifetime Achievement Award at NAMM, the video I posted states that his concepts lead directly to the AI composing platforms of today.

The point is Jan Hammer had no qualms about generative composing software and was a very early adopter.

All that was just posted, but I suppose you would’ve had to read it to know that — just keep cranking out hits on your coal fired harpsichord or whatever.

[Tubeman]

He used Dr. T’s Algorithmic Composer software on a Commodore 64 with his Fairlight to do the Miami Vice stuff.

That has nothing to do with AI.

[guitarzan]

He used Dr. T’s Algorithmic Composer software on a Commodore 64 with his Fairlight to do the Miami Vice stuff.

That has nothing to do with AI.

DR T’s Algorithm Composer is the conceptually same thing without prompting — it’s basically still the underpinnings used in AI music composition.

[sellyoursoul]

I would hate to hold such a derided view of music and musicians with the goal to boot of pumping out music for charts. Sounds like a pretty crap experience to me. But to each their own I guess.