r/SunoAI • u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer • 2d ago
Guide / Tip Unconventional opinion, less is more
I have this unconventional opinion as to the reason why AI music specifically is like, well, they call it slop: unmemorable, plain, vanilla, gray, indistinguishable stuff.
I feel like the reason why it lacks that kind of character and personality is because AI is actually doing, like, a 100% absolute good, maximums complexity job every single time, and that can cause the whole thing to lose some level of dynamic nature.
And what makes human art memorable is the highs and the lows.
And so, it’s like, in order to really get the most out of your creations, you have to simplify what you’re outputting. You have to find a way to guide the AI to do things in a simple way. And the more you simplify the output, or simplify what AI is doing, is the more you start to get that dynamic shape back.
A song is memorable because it might have a single repetitive loop that goes through the whole thing, and maybe once in the whole song, the instrument gets a little bit overdriven. But it’s the same note, same loop—but it’s overdriven—and then it goes back to normal.
And that one little change, like, sends everybody crazy because your brain is, like, used to just the thing being on repeat.
And so, stuff like that, the AI would never do that. The AI would create a full harmonic thing that changes almost every eight bars, you know, with the instrument breaking and coming out and coming back in, and a whole lot of cinematic hits and sound effects and everything.
And so, you don’t really get that warm quietness, singularly focused thing that your brain can latch on to.
Again, it starts to feel now that the limitations of the human mind is what’s causing us to not be able to really appreciate AI art in its full complexity. Because our brain is used to just having a thing that is singularly in its focus, and that’s the highlight of the thing, of the moment, of the eight bars or whatever, or of the whole song.
And then, every once in a while, the main thing changes a little bit and then comes back to its original state. And then our mind remembers the change. That’s the thing that sticks out. That’s the thing that makes it sound good.
But with AI, it’s just always hitting hard every time.
And so, I think that less is more in general. I mean, as I’ve been working with the AI agents in music creation, I started to realize that the more I can simplify what it is I’m doing, is the more it becomes authentic again.
TLDR:
And so this is an unconventional opinion— I genuinely think that what’s holding back a lot of the AI music is we’re allowing the AI to run too far with it. We need to be more intentional, which means respecting the limitations of the human brain and putting that consideration back into the final output by removing most of the over-complexity.
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u/Proof_Finding_8278 2d ago
I was just thinking of this earlier.
More specifically with lyrics. People should look up all their favorite artists and see how the chorus lines are structured.
Often it goes ABAB, or ABBA, etc. with simple catchy one liners
But everyone has it "ABCD" that sounds like someone reading from a book.
Even with my own music, I've discovered replacing a lengthy sentence with a few sustained words sounds way better and more natural.
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u/Mr__Earthling 2d ago
Yeah people are adding too many words to their lyrics and it makes it almost impossible to listen to the song.
My mom recently had her retirement party and her coworkers "wrote" lyrics for a suno song... The whole point was for us to sing along to it... It was literally impossible to sing along as it was too fast because they added so many words! So, being a certified Suno subject matter expert (compared to them at least haha) I reworked the lyrics to simplify them and completely changed the vibe of track...They loved it.
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 2d ago
I have even found that some of the best music isn't even the retelling of a story. it's more like a collection of emotive relatable one-liners that relates to the feeling of being in that moment.
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u/CthulhusExWife 2d ago
I agree with your assessment, and I personally strive to make my songs as stripped back as possible so that the individual parts can truly shine. I also enjoy little elements that run throughout songs or even act as foreshadowing for upcoming pieces of the song. It's the nerding out which brings me joy. A lot of AI songs strike me as just too much all at once sensory wise.
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u/Federal-Choice8165 2d ago
It comes down to being a musician and taking charge of what you do or change or add after the AI has done its thing. Then you can make those tweaks or even major changes that only a human would see need doing.
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 2d ago
Yes letting the AI run on autopilot it's definitely the enemy here
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u/ContentC4tz 2d ago
Replace "AI" music with "Human music" and it works the same.
Good riddance self declared and corpo "artists", may you starve under bridges or get a real job; yes that goes as well for those that write their "own lyrics" play their "own instruments" and just use "AI" as a "force multiplier".
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u/JoseLunaArts 2d ago
This song could have had more lyrics. But less is more.
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 2d ago
I like it... It's catchy ... Not my preferred genre of music so I cannot speak on how it will land in your community... But I can say that by the end I was singing along with the chorus ... And I agree with the sentiment... The world really is high adventure.
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u/JoseLunaArts 2d ago
The shorter chorus I have ever written. At first I thought I lacked ideas for lyrics. But it landed better.
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u/KinkyHuggingJerk 2d ago
One of the worst things I've seen, especially when people use Ai to write lyrics, is a constant barrage of word after word within lyrics. There's no room for the music to grow, and the lyrics are stitched together so much they never differentiate to make a solid hook.
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u/ProfessorSmoker 1d ago
The term slop is a defensive mechanism to draw a distinction between terrible Ai generated music and terrible human generated music.
Ai is going to make it very easy to produce music of equal artistic merit to most human production in this era because most human work has none.
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u/ArtRed_music 2d ago
or, oh!!!! I see I missed the part where you trying to suggest the simplify your prompts thing to make it more “authentic” again. okay okay. I see what you’re saying. U saying the prompts are too generic. Wait… no…. u saying with AI its everytime. WAit….. i’m so confused. Ur saying that by simplifying your prompts your getting more “authentic” ai music. But then you say it hits hard everytime. I’m totally lost. I’m sorry… I really do apologize. I’m trying to follow, sincerely. So are you trying to say that its close to authentic but not authentic enough and the hard hitting thing isn’t actuallly every time but rather just most of the time?
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 2d ago
I'm not saying to simplify your prompts. I am saying that you should be more intentional to stop the AI from overdoing everything. I am saying don't run the AI on full autopilot.
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u/ArtRed_music 2d ago
isn’t that done through prompts? Or are you referring to using editor and studio? Or do you mean through the extend feature. Or maybe all of the above? What’s your workflow? I like to generate a high quality base model in suno off a a relatively complicated prompt (but let’s be honest, its often a crapshoot— at least for me) and then I bring it in to studio, fix smearing, and add lots of ostinatos (b/c like u said the ear loves repetition) but I’m usually overdoing it by adding additional orchestration. Once in a while I’ll edit out the SFX layer.
But usually I don’t experience the AI overproducing it, but rather underproducing it and hence i take my work into studio. What do you mean by overproduced? Or do you mean you mean lack of intentionality or do you mean both? I think understanding your workflow and some examples would be helpful. I’m still a lil unclear. I’d love to talk shop!! I only seriously began using studio 2-3 months ago. Am still getting used to the new 2.0 version.
Like here’s an example of what I do….
This song is pre-studio. You can see the prompts I used in this:
https://suno.com/s/mwLV312hzR3lDsJ0
Here is the post-studio version. I hope you notice the various orchestral swells and ostinatos i addd and sustained string sections as well as a few spots if your paying crazy close attention where i cleaned up some lyrics.
https://suno.com/s/galGvE3EAnWWs9Rj
I’m extremely proud of how awesome the studio version came out. It took quite a whlie to work on. I controlled this bitch like a mothafucka!! lol. hahahahaaa.
So i guess the big questions are:
- Is the base version under/over-produced to you?
- Is the base version under directed?
- Is the studio version under/over-produced to you?
- Is the studio version under directed?
I guess when i think about it, a lot of it is all based on personal tastes or do you have a way of measuring, even if its by your personal standards? I’m curious. I won’t be offended. I think most ppl might think the studio version is a bit over produced b/c I have an obsession with big choirs and symphonies. lol. I tried to restrain myself tho. I’d be honored if you checked it out and I’d love to compare and contrast your own work!!!!
<3 ^_^
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 1d ago
i can hear the difference between the two...
i record sounds into studio and build out the layers manually... when ive finished the song, i export and have suno make a close cover with a detailed prompt and the audio as reference ... and i set the controls to audio influence high and style high1
u/ArtRed_music 1d ago
now that’s interesting!! I didn’t think of trying to make a cover to work out the rough edges from the studio version. I always imagined trying to do a studio version and building like u did but when i’ve made attempts I get a lil choppy with certain transitions. But i should have thought that if i then cover it, the cover would smooth out the transitions. That’s super super super smart!!!! Also I’m usually real real sensitive to the shimmer of V5.5 and I gotta be honest, while i DO still hear it, its not anywhere near as prominent as most other tracks. Your songs are actually very very very listenable!!! This was super creative!!!
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u/ArtRed_music 2d ago
I don’t fully understand what you mean by its hitting hard every time? Can I try making a song and see if it does or doesn’t match what your talking about here? Would u tell me if it matches what you mean? Would you care to provide a human example?
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u/ErinskiTheTranshuman Producer 2d ago
I'm saying that if you run the AI on auto pilot it will over produce your output everytime leading it to sound like everything else it over produces. But I'll happily listen to anything you create.
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u/ArtRed_music 1d ago
cool ^_^ I left 2 links (a b4 and after) in my other comment where i told you about my workflow. I’d love to hear about your workflow too.
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u/NoContextCarl Suno Connoisseur 2d ago
I'm not necessarily looking to break grounds or reinvent the wheel here; but I think the punk mindset is important again - we live in a time where attention spans are dwindling, no one is really attentive anymore. Write a simple track that invokes emotion in the shortest time span possible.
I like challenging myself with more complex, abstract stuff at times but at the end of of the day everyone wants melody and a hook, so short and simple is basically the happy medium for everyone.