Music: Jitters

When I was picking which songs were to go on The Whammy, I had to cut a bunch of instrumental songs for a variety of reasons. I'll just call this a B-Side.

Jitters - 1.84MB, 128kbit mp3

Music: Earth Proton Whistlers

I'm going to keep posting little things like this.

Earth Proton Whistlers - 2.06MB, 128kbit mp3
[Unfinished and not mastered]

ISSn't It Romantic?

Despite being a huge space geek and NASA fan, I don’t see much to be gained by putting people in little metal cans and whipping them into low Earth orbit. This isn’t easy for me to admit. Seriously. Other than sheer desire to be in orbit myself (translation: jealousy), I can’t rationalize any reasons for it, and believe me I want to...



I’m talking about the International Space Station. The shuttle is a whole other argument, and I think I still cheer for that. You see, there are those brief moments, when you’re certain you’ve just seen astronauts do something that only humans could do, something that proves just how adaptable we are.

But the massive costs and incredible risks of the Space Station are a tremendous price to pay for… whatever it is they’re doing. I would like to think that this is just an awkward water-wings phase for us in space – that we’re just getting used to it and we’ll eventually swim great distances – but the program is already bigger than what most people are comfortable with, and it bears little resemblance to an actual trip to somewhere like Mars. From what I can tell, the ISS is mostly an extremely expensive educational program filled with strange assurances that diseases will be cured and new products will be spawned.

I should clarify something though, I do think that humans will (and should) be spreading as far and wide as possible, but that’s a long way off. I’d be a lot happier if all our eggs weren’t in one basket.

All the real adventure these days is done by little rovers and flying giants, and it's far more conceivable that the first ground-breaking on Mars will be done by a shovel operated from Pasadena.

I'm hoping someone will tell me why I'm wrong about the ISS.

$Hit Song Science

A few weeks ago, something called "Hit Song Science" by Polyphonic HMI (Human Media Interface) was all over the news. The service claims to use an Artificial Intelligence to analyze songs with an algorithm and compare them to a database they've compiled of hit songs since 1956 to determine whether or not they have "hit potential."

I believe that AIs have come a long way in recent years, but I also believe that a company will use the term “AI” instead of “program” because it sounds like it can’t be bought, replicated, or (most importantly) understood. Audio processing has definitely become extremely powerful too, but something about the reporting on it didn’t settle well with me. In addition to the all the spelling errors on their webpage, Polyphonic HMI doesn't say if their analysis has ever been proven or independently confirmed. They often refer to "optimal mathematical patterns" that is common to most hit songs, though in the various news reports and in the FAQ on their webpage they only cite one example of a success they predicted - Norah Jones. I’m a bit of a stickler, so I wouldn’t mind seeing proof that they actually predicted her success, as opposed to simply testing her music later and finding out it fit in the scheme.

They also allow themselves plenty of outs, saying that this service is only a tool that must be used in conjunction with human ears, and the song must be promoted well with an appropriate artist. OK, problem number one: “the appropriate artist.” So are they examining the written music, and not the texture that an actual recording provides? How many versions of “I Only Have Eyes for You” have I heard? Because the only one I ever liked is by the Flamingos. I won’t even get into something as basic as tempo, and that’s something that will change quite a bit with every performer.

But they seem to be testing the actual recorded material, because written music does not encompass all of this:

"Some of these event [sic] are patterns in melody, harmony, chord progression, brilliance, fullness of sound, beat, tempo, rhythm, octave, and pitch."

Maybe there’s more to their submission process, but many of the articles and the company webpage say that people and studios submit CDs of the music. Obviously there’s a lot of audio technology that is way beyond my understanding, but to my knowledge, there aren't algorithms that can process a song and determine even half of attributes they suggest.

How about a testimonial? How about one person that swears by it? Surely someone in the music industry believes it really helped. This leads to another one of their outs: "the song must be promoted well." One thing I've learned working in television is that promotion can be spun many, many different ways - usually to cover up a failure. Everyone in entertainment is in search of their audience, and it's very easy blame bad or inappropriate promotion. Sometimes it's true. Sometimes promotion can make someone useless a hit. It's a pretty big and hugely vague variable.

I want to hear some negative responses from them too. I want to hear about someone big who had a huge failure just as they predicted. Have any of their clients been told that they weren’t hit songwriters?

Finally there’s the price tag: over five grand per CD submitted. It’s just low enough that extremely desperate-for-success musicians can afford it, but certainly an acceptable wage for an artificial intelligence (somebody’s got to feed the little apps).

Unlike much of outrage this service has incited, I’m not another whining musician (in fact, my talents as an actual instrument player are pretty sad). Nor do I think there’s some kind of magic in music that can never be quantified. I like science, I like automation, and I even like the idea of some music being made entirely by an AI.

I also have a pretty good nose for bullshit.