On April 1, more than 200 music notables (including Billie Eilish, Stevie Wonder, 3 Balvin and Jon Bon Jovi) of the Artists Rights Alliance issued an open letter warning against the “predatory use of AI” in the music industry. The letter cites AI’s capability to steal professional artists’ voices and likenesses, violate creators’ rights and “destroy the music ecosystem.” The letter further calls on tech companies, AI developers and digital music services to pledge that they won’t develop or use AI-powered technology the undermines songwriters and artists or prevents them from earning compensation for their art. What are your views and/or concerns relative to artificial intelligence and its impact on music and sound?
The “music industry” sometimes attacks new technology, especially if it disrupts the status quo — whether it’s transitioning from tape to computer-based recording, drum machines, CDs, MP3s, Auto-Tune, streaming, etc. — and AI is certainly no different. Like any new thing there are good uses and bad uses. To the good, AI is helping clean up bad recordings & mixes, create stems from full mixes, and help jumpstart ideation when writing. It can also literally change one voice into another, and that seems to be where this one feels different. What voices are being used to train that AI and why? If the intent by the AI and its user is to plagiarize and otherwise steal intellectual property and performances from existing writers and artists, then we’ll need rules/laws in place to protect against that “predatory use.” I do tend to be a futurist when it comes to adopting new technologies so my bet is we’ll find a way collectively to get the best from AI without destroying the industry (or the world?). Humans still love to hear music made by other humans and I’m guessing that will never change.
How do new technologies, markets and platforms figure in your creative/business plans. For example, with NFTs gaining momentum, do you foresee related music and sound work resulting? Same for VR/AR? Will increased content spurred on by the emergence of additional streaming platforms open up music and sound opportunities for you? Any growth prospects in the advertising and/or entertainment industry?
While the old guard may get twitchy over new technologies, its usually very exciting to us as artists & musicians — mostly because we’re all nerds and love to geek out on new stuff, especially if it’s a new way to share and monetize our art. But we have to be careful. Retooling our studios and workflows to accommodate a new technology can be extremely costly in both time and money. Whenever a buzzy new thing comes around, we have to decide whether it’s a flash-in-the-pan thing (3D TVs), will we lose our asses if it goes sideways (NFTs), or is it more durable and long-term (Dolby Atmos). Next, do we really have the bandwidth and ability to sell into the market for that new tech or are there competitors ahead of us? Before we jump in there’s always some mix of classic cost-benefit analysis along with an educated guess whether our clients really need it. And then, are we the best ones to give it to them? If not, we’ll always try to find a partner with better expertise so we can at least have a solution for clients when it comes up.
How has your role–or that of your business or company–evolved in recent years? What do you like most about that evolution? What do you like least?
The biggest evolution, no doubt, has been the shift to decentralized production and working-from-home. In so many ways, the pandemic just fast-forwarded a transition that could likely have happened a decade before. It’s been really great for many of our team members’ quality of life, being able to work where they want, etc. But of course you lose some of the team culture that naturally develops by being in the studio together for so many hours a day.
What was the biggest creative challenge posed to you by a recent project? Tell us about that project, why the challenge was particularly noteworthy or gratifying to overcome, or what valuable lesson you learned from it.
We produced a project for Audible called ORIGINS. With less than 24hrs notice, the BANG team in NYC had to get a recording package to Billie Eilish while on her US tour in Salt Lake City for a 10pm interview, fly an engineer from London to the South of Portugal to record our host (a 4am record for him!). Many favors were asked for and received. Valuable lesson learned: Never underestimate the kindness and ingenuity of the German husband of a French concierge at a Salt Lake City Hotel. And Billie was great!
What recent work are you most proud of and why? Or what recent work (advertising or entertainment)–your own or that of others–has struck a responsive chord with you?
Our composer, Timo Elliston, recently completed the score for the second season of the Hulu series, Life & Beth. It’s an amazing mix of great jazz a la season one, but also added opera and some other genres that really stretch the form beyond the typical scripted comedy score. We recorded the jazz live at Electric Lady Studios and the opera pieces with an all-female orchestra at Sear Sound so its steeped in the classic NY City sound.
A growing number of superstar artists and songwriters have been selling their music rights/catalogs in megabuck deals. What will be the ripple effect of this on music creatively and from a business standpoint relative to the advertising, film, TV and streaming platform markets?
It simply means we’ll see more licenses for these catalogs as the folks who have paid said “megabucks” will seek to earn back their investments. If what’s past is prologue, we’ll see some beautiful, clever, creative uses of amazing songs… and also plenty of silly ones that make very little sense for the product or scene.
