I’ve been thinking of writing this blog for a few months, but have held back because I’ve had too much to say about it and wasn’t sure if I could write it in a concise way.  But in the end, I decided I’d try and get all my thoughts down regardless!

Anyone that has been within earshot of me in the past two years will have heard me moaning about the use of AI in music.  

It has been bubbling away in the background for a while, but seems to have leapt forward into mainstream consciousness over the past year or so.

In fact, it’s already everywhere.  I hear AI voiceovers on videos, and see AI posts on social media, and AI images on the internet.

People are relying on AI more and more for every aspect of their life, and that worries me.  If we become completely reliant on computers, it will leave us in a very vulnerable position.

But this is a music blog, and it’s AI in music that I want to talk about.

AI and Creativity

I was recently chatting with some people about a song we were writing and someone, quite innocently, said, “Why don’t we get AI to write a bridge?”.

Well, I ranted for quite while over that one.  Are we that lazy that we’re going to get a computer to actually write the song for us?  Is this what it’s come to? 

Don’t get me wrong, I think AI has its uses.  If it can help fix global warming or come up with new cures for cancer more quickly, then that’s amazing and should be applauded.

But can anyone tell me why it’s going for creativity first?   Creativity is a beautifully human thing and it seems such a shame to have an algorithm taking over from the people that are quietly creating art and music.

This surely seems like a solution to a problem that was never there.

Someone (I can’t remember who) recently said: “AI is supposed to do the boring stuff so that humans can concentrate on the fun things in life, like music.  But AI is doing all the fun stuff, and leaving us to sort out the tedious tasks.”

AI and Musicians

AI is being fed music from millions of songs (none of which have been consented to), mashes them up and uses the data to create millions more.

The problem with that is that it is taking jobs away from actual musicians.

At the time of writing, I’ve not been affected too badly, although the ambient music I’ve been getting some income from has been replaced on Spotify playlists by AI-generated ambient music.

But if something isn’t done soon, then the future for most musicians, from starters to big names, will be very bleak.

Why Is It Happening?

It’s not like we can look to our leaders for support.  Governments seem to be siding with big tech companies and putting AI at the forefront of everything, whether or not they have any real benefit to people.

And some of the reasoning is suspect:

Mikey Shulman, CEO of Suno AI, claimed that Suno is needed because “it’s not enjoyable to make music anymore”.

Really?  If that’s the case, then why are millions and millions of people around the world still doing it?

Why do people come to my studio to record their songs?

Why do they write songs in the first place?

Why do people, young and old, learn to play instruments, in every single country you can think of?

Are all these people being pressured into making music?  No, they’re doing it because they want to, and because they love music and they love creating it.

Will I Be Using It?

My theory is that every time you use AI, in whatever context, you’re one step closer to taking a job from a human.

So, I will not be engaging with AI.  I won’t use ChatGPT for answers.  I won’t use anything but my own brain to write blogs and social media posts.   I won’t be using AI images.  I won’t be getting an AI girlfriend any time soon (my wife might have a few things to say about that anyway).  

If that makes me come across as a luddite, I don’t care.

But, most of all, I won’t be using AI in my music.  Not for instrumentation, not for lyrics, not for structures. 

I really like the challenge of writing a song, or creating a piece of music, of producing an artist’s song.  It’s like a puzzle; and creating something out of nothing is very rewarding.

And all humans create differently; every musician has a different set up intrinsically human idiosyncrasies and tastes and skills – which is why you might enjoy music from one artist and not another.

But if everything is being melded together and electronically spewed out for your tastes, that is going to become boring for everyone very quickly.

Everyone, that is, apart from the tech companies who will be rolling in even more cash.

What Next?

So what next?  People say that live music won’t be affected, but it already is!  Look at Abba Voyage: the band members can sit at home raking in the money whilst their avatars do all the work.  

It can’t be long until other big bands and artists go the same way.

My wife has an upbeat attitude to it.  She says, if AI starts to take over, it’s a computer, so just unplug it!

I really wish I could.

There were three releases over Autumn that I meant to write about but didn’t get chance. Turns out they are all Northern, so they fit nicely into one blog!

John Hardy – Country and Northern EP

I worked with John Hardy on his last EP and it was great to work with him again for his current EP, the very aptly named Country and Northern.

A Hull native, his songs generally split into stunningly beautiful ballads (Car Radio, Fair Love, Ebb and Flow) and dry-witted, upbeat ditties.

John usually has a pretty solid idea of what he wants on the tracks so I tend to largely take a back seat from playing and instead facilitate the sounds he hears in his head.

He’s a superb singer and guitarist, and he brings a whole plethora of extra musicians into the mix, including his wife Loreto on extra vocals, a cellist, pianist and a harmonica player.

For tracks like Same Old Country Song he wanted to create the sound of a rough and ready band playing in a room together, whereas Old Bones hints at the classic sound and songwriting of another northerner, Richard Hawley.

Here’s John’s Bandcamp, or you can listen on Spotify here.

Michelle Laverick – Selkie Child EP

Teeside-raised Michelle visited the studio over the summer to record her debut EP of astonishingly atmospheric and evocative folk songs, Selkie Child.

The vocals and guitars were recorded live in one take, to keep the natural organic pace and haunting feel of the songs.

Onstage, Michelle plays harmoniums and shruti boxes by taping the revelant keys down and pressing the squeeze boxes with her foot. For this recording, we decided to overdub these so that we could get a better sound and more dynamics.

I added some subtle embellishments in places (electric ambient guitar, bass, piano, plus drums on Sweet Tees), and we got some superb strings added by Jas Scott for Selkie Child, but really the goal was to let Michelle’s voice, guitar and songs shine.

Before these sessions, I never knew that you could buy partial capos! Michelle used two on one guitar, which blew my mind. I do love capos, so Immediately ordered two…

Michelle isn’t on Spotify but you can listen and download the EP on Bandcamp here.

Scarlett Whincup – Where I’ll Stay

And finally, the debut single from Halifax-based singer Scarlett Whincup.  Although she’s been a professional Country singer for a while now, this is the first song she’s ever written, and what a way to start!

Scarlett spent a day with me, and we built the song up with both of us playing acoustic guitars, then I added electric guitars, piano, bass, drums and percussion, before we recorded Scarlett’s vocals.

Scarlett’s lead vocal took very little time as she’s an accomplished singer, but we also added loads of backing vocals, which took the song up another level.

The whole time I was thinking, I can’t believe this is her first song! I will very much look forward to hear what she does next.

Where I’ll Stay is available on Spotify here, as well as other streaming services.

I recently went to the Royal Albert Hall to watch the final concert by one of my favourite bands, Clannad.

I’ve been a fan of Clannad since 1985 when my sister bought the 12” single of In a Lifetime.  I played the record constantly, trying to get my head around the beauty of the stunning melodies and lush harmonies over the four songs.   The music took me to another place.

To this very day, I listen to Clannad for escapism.  There is always space in my brain for their music which sounds in turn Celtic, peaceful and mysterious.  As someone who loves those three elements in music, this is musical gold!

Although they’ve been recording since 1973, it’s their run of albums from 1983’s Magical Ring to 1998’s Landmarks that I love the most, with 1995’s Lore album my very favourite.

I encourage anyone to delve deep into their catalogue and get lost in this music.  They are one of my favourite bands of all time.

I have seen them live a number of times over the years, but now in their late sixties/early seventies, they decided to bow out with a gig celebrating their 1984 album Legend.

Well-rehearsed and evidently emotional, Clannad gave it their all.

Clannad has always been a family band consisting of siblings Moya (vocals, harp), Ciarán (double bass, synth, vocals) and Pól (flute, guitar, synth, vocals).  Their uncles Pádraig and Noel Brennan died in 2016 and 2022, respectively, but they have been ably replaced by singer Moya’s children.  The band’s sisters were also on hand to supply backing vocals.

It was a pleasure to see saxophonist Mel Collins play live, and special mention also to the drummer, who played an astounding gig.

For me, highlights included hearing a full-length version of Herne, hearing Together We for the first time, and a stunningly beautiful rendition of Lady Marian, as well as classics such as Newgrange and Theme from Harry’s Game.

It was a privilege to be there.

Here’s a playlist of 15 of my personal favourite Clannad songs.  I hope you find as much enjoyment in them as I do!

Dear Music by Fawn Music came out on Saturday.

Fawn Music is Bex Johnstone, who came to me two years ago with a whole bunch of songs that she’d been writing throughout her life but never released for various reasons.  

On our first meet-up, she explained that she needed a safe space to be able to express herself and warned that there may be tears, but it’s all part of the process; she wanted to be completely unfiltered in her songwriting and singing.

That was fine with me.  It actually reminded me of an interview I’d read with Alanis Morrissette where she said a similar thing to her producer Glen Ballard when they made Jagged Little Pill.  And I love that album.

Bex grew up on the Scottish island of Islay and has been singing since she was a child.  

She has a very pure, Celtic voice which is an absolute dream to record.  We soon learnt that the less processing I put on Bex’s vocals, the better.  Just some lush reverb, and away we go!

Bex is a very prolific songwriter.  I would estimate that she brought about 60 songs to me throughout the making of the album.  Some we recorded, some we didn’t.   Some songs were fully fleshed out and others were semi-improvised.

There is one song on the album called Anchor Me, which went through, literally, hundreds of different takes before it was complete.

The backing vocals and basic beat stayed the whole time but Bex experimented with different lyrics, melodies, even spoken word, and we added so many instruments, percussion, interesting samples etc.  At one point, the song was actually 28 minutes long!  And yet, it somehow never got boring.

And then there were songs that were played live in the studio.  Dear Music, Running and Hey Mara were just Bex and her acoustic guitar, recorded live into a single microphone.

But we fleshed some of them out – Dear Music contained some unbelievably evocative cellos from Jas from a band called Spaceacre.  Running contained some of my field recordings in the background, bleeps and a beat that is actually me slapping my legs, through a processor!

Other songs played into Bex’s love of Bon Iver, particularly Vulnerability, which was the last track we finished.  Like many songs on the album, it had been through a number of versions until we stripped it back to vocals, electric piano and guitar.  

When Bex wasn’t looking, I added synth bass, marching snares and piano and it quickly became one of her favourites.

One of my favourites to record was Breathe Again.  Towards the end of the recording of the album, Bex had the melody and chords and, without even rehearsing, we recorded the take that’s on the album, Bex singing and me playing piano.  

I learnt a lot from Bex whilst making this album.  

For instance, I’d never been one to make my own samples but Bex loves them so that encouraged me to delve into them more.  For example, the breathy synth sound on the chorus of Recovery is a sample of Bex’s voice, and other songs have samples of birds that are detuned to something ghostly. There were also unintentional samples – it rained during the recording of the song Dear Music but the sound of it on the roof added to the ambience of the recording.

It was also interesting seeing how many different places Bex was prepared to take a song.  I encouraged Bex to release some of the alternate takes of the songs on EPs, which came out before the album.  So, for example, for Anchor Me, there’s the main version, an acoustic version with a rap, and an instrumental remix so that you can write your own lyrics to it.

But even the EPs weren’t enough to contain Bex’s prodigious songwriting output.  She was still bringing new songs in when I was mixing the album!

But this means that she has plenty of songs to consider when she records her second album.  

It took her 35 years to start recording her first album but I feel there’ll be no stopping her now.

You can hear the album on all streaming services. Here it is on Spotify:

PS Bex gave me one of the best reviews I’ve ever had!

It’s funny; three separate people over the last two weeks have messaged me and said it’s like I’ve vanished off the face of the Earth.

I’ve definitely been quieter on my blogs and on social media recently – and I aim to change this – but believe me, I’ve been very busy under the hood.

For a while, I took the spotlight off my production work whilst getting started on library music (which isn’t particularly bloggable!). I was still producing but just not really talking about it.

But I have lots to talk about, and have a few blogs coming up over the next few weeks.

Meanwhile, there are a few changes coming up.

In 2025, I’ll be increasing my pricing for production.

Until recently, I’ve played most of the instruments on the tracks I produce. I know I’m very capable of doing that, but on the odd occasion when a session musician is brought in, I am always gobsmacked at how much better it sounds.

So, I want to incorporate more live musicians, especially live drums.

I want to spend more time on each song I produce, getting the very best out of the song, the production, the mixing, everything.

I just want everything to the best it can be.

But all of these things I can’t do at my current price point (which has been the same for about ten years!) so I’ll be blogging about the new prices in the new year.

In the meantime, hopefully you’ll be a bit hearing more from me on Facebook and Instagram.

Between Christmas and new year, my wife Sarah and our kids head down to Eastbourne to stay with Sarah’s family, whilst I stay at home.

As I’m not in the studio at this time of the year, it gives me a rare four days with absolutely no responsibilities!

About 15 years ago, I remember being happy but a little bored. I recall saying to Sarah that I was ready for a new challenge. And with that, we had two kids and I started a music production business, all within the space of four years.

Now, I don’t have time to be bored! There’s always something that needs to be done. So these four days right at the end of the year are important ones.

I’m currently making plans for 2024. I love a new year in the same way that I used to enjoy getting a new exercise book in school. It’s brand new, looks great and there are no mistakes!

I keep a home-made Word calendar where I put all work and leisure appointments. I scour the internet for everything that’s happening in Derbyshire and add things to the calendar that might be interesting to me and the family.

Honestly, we don’t do 98% of the things I put on the calendar but at least I know there’s something to do every day if we want to. I love the possibilities of the new year

I also plan for the studio.

I’ll always produce solo artists and still love working on people’s songs, but you’ll notice on my website that I’ve changed the Music for Media heading to Library Music. I love making it and it’s doing well, so far.

I’ve got some new plugins, and read some articles on new methods of production. I have a few new artists to work with in the new year and will also be planning some new library music releases.

But for now, I’ve got the fire on, cup of tea made, silence in the house. I’m very much an introvert so it’s good to have some time to recharge!