It’s all too easy to forget just how good today’s music lovers have it. We’re able to hear whatever track we want, be it the latest release or an old classic. And where previously you may spend £50/$50 dollars per month, trawling stores to find your music fix, paying a fifth of that for instant access really does seem to be too good to be true.
The price we pay for such luxury?
Nagging doubts that somebody somewhere is keeping all our money instead of giving it to the artists we love. That those artists (and future artists) will give up entirely due to having to earn a living (and not being paid one). Or have their human talent rendered entirely redundant through the advent of ever more powerful AI capable of creating infinite songs in any style to drown the market.
Welcome to the future.
But let’s keep it light. Let's take a leaf out of former Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo’s book and – contrary to the position held by many musicians of his stature – find an irrefutable brightside.
"We all know the negative part of it – obviously, the change we've had to witness. But, hey, that's evolution. That's life,” explained a breezy Lombardo on his recent appearance on the RRBG podcast. “We're gonna be viejitos [little old men] if we start complaining about it. It's, like, 'Oh, you know, back in my day,' this and that. It's, like, no – you have to go with the flow."
Head in the sand? Or simply wise words from someone who’s sufficiently experienced and chilled to know what’s really going on?
"I think there's a lot of advantages in today's industry,” Lombardo continued. “You could put music out – anybody could put music out and anybody could record it at home. And there are just so many advantages.
"The research that you can do online to clear up any questions, if you have a problem. All those are brilliant advantages. And I think we should embrace those and use them to our benefit.
“I think if we sit around and complain about things, you're really missing the point."
"You've been given all these great tools, and I think it's just better for us all around. Yes, I can go down the path and complain and nitpick all these little things, but, man, I don't view life that way. If something's holding it back, if you fall, get up, brush yourself off, keep moving forward. If something happens, 'Fuck. That hurt. Well, let's go. Come on. So that's just my personality."
And while Lombardo’s happy-go-lucky attitude to the changes rapidly taking place within music may seem a little off-target, he successfully nails one area in which no-one is going to argue.
“I'd like to see AI perform it live. The human element, the feeling of having a Marshall stack being played in front of you and some subwoofer and low end from a drummer on a real drum set. There's nothing like that.
"It could be possible that people will forget, something will come in and take its place and people will forget what that feels like, but hopefully not.
"That aspect, live music, I think people need that, people need to get out and see and experience that, a live performance, so I don't see that going away. AI definitely can't replace that."
We hope that – for the foreseeable future at least – that Lombardo proves to be right.
