suno

Part 10: My Experience Using Suno Pro to Create a Studio Quality Single of a Song I Wrote

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One of my creative pursuits outside of writing (and a 14-year freelance writing career), was music performance and writing songs. I was even given a chance to be a piano accompanist to a singer on the road once, but I turned it down to avoid living in hotels (no, possibly motels) every night. Regardless, the passion for writing songs that could be creative, yet still mainstream, went on. Much of that stagnated during my busy writing career years. Only in the last couple of years have I seriously gone back to finally realizing some songs swimming around in my head.

The irony here is that I’d just started this new blog theme about AI and human creativity while finishing up a new song from last year. I was hoping to find a way to create a studio-quality version of the song, yet didn’t have the resources to hire out musicians and record a demo in a local studio. Despite having a work colleague who leases a local music studio, it still would cost considerable money to hire a singer and musicians for possibly several days of recording sessions.

Enter my curiosity with Suno, particularly their Suno Pro tier. I thought to myself, why not just dive in, sign up for Suno Pro for $10 per month, and then create a studio version of my song? It was a test to see whether my initial aversion toward Suno was perhaps too much of an impulsive negative response. 

What happened afterward changed my view on the usefulness of Suno Pro, even if I still have reservations about how it turns your songs into ear-popping studio magic.

You’ll Be Shocked at the First Suno Pro Results

We all know that many AI bots are a bit, what shall we say—(stupid?)—in realizing our prompts. You really have to be overly specific or use key language to get many AI bots to accurately create what you want. The problem there is, you shouldn’t become a lethargic creator and let AI bots create everything for you. It requires a lot more in explanation if you want it to create everything from scratch. In my case, I just wanted a studio-quality take of my first song called “Whispered Thoughts (The Girl Who Reads My Mind).”

All I did was write one small paragraph of prompts to make Suno Pro create a studio take with a male singer. I didn’t need anything else since I write all my songs organically at the piano on the Notion composing app. Yes, I use an Apple Pencil on my iPad Pro to write it all out one note/chord at a time—with my own lyrics. 

The most amazing thing about Suno is that it seems to get what you want right from the first take. When I played back the first cut with a male singer, I was impressed at hearing the song fully realized with studio sound. This was after months of just hearing a piano solo playback on the Notion app.

But then, I decided to create some alternate versions. Since my above song is intended to have gender fluidity in the lyrics, I created a female take next. It almost sounded like Taylor Swift singing, yet it turned out more than well. However, it wasn’t quite as perfect as the initial male take. After several more alternate takes with both male and female singers (including an attempted duet), Suno seemed to kind of go off the rails on making it really radio-friendly, even if the prompts hardly changed. 

Perhaps Suno should be called “One Take Suno” since it appears to give you the best possible cut on first try. All other versions seem to variate too much off the best path to a point of annoyance. Once that happens, it’s hard to get Suno to go back to the original style.

My Intentions for the Song

Thanks to the mostly stunning results from Suno Pro, my intention is to take “Whispered Thoughts” and place it on SoundCloud through their basic Artist tier. There, they’ll promote the song to the right audiences, and then it’ll stream on their site for a small price. But my full, long-term plan is to pay into a streaming distributor in the next several months and get the song out to many other streaming outlets. A distributor like DistroKid can help on that front, not including joining a publishing watchdog group to help with royalties on other media uses. Also, joining performance rights organizations like ASCAP or BMI brings additional eyes to your songs and pays you when it’s played somewhere.

All of this goes on the idea that the initial singers will not be me, but digital creations. At the core of importance, though, is continuously noting that I’m the complete writer of the songs. I’m still an adamant proponent of creating things from your own brain rather than letting AI constantly tempt you into creating something for you. Never will I let Suno create a song for me—even if some will argue that letting it create a studio cut is at least a quarter of an AI creation. 

I argue not, as long as you specifically tell Suno not to deviate from the music. You have to move the dials a bit on the “Options” section when putting in your prompts. They let you choose how much of a percentage of Weirdness and Style Influence you want based on the recording you feed it. In my case, I uploaded a video of the Notion app piano solo as the initial source.

I’ve Come Around to Accept AI as a Creative Assistant

My first impressions of Suno from the outset were one of derision before putting it to use. You have to be suspect at first when you realize all of the singing voices and instrumentation used to create a studio cut are taken from existing sources. This bothered me since I’m a staunch advocate for protecting IP and not having it being made available for free license.

Those who argue that a large potpourri of these musical properties constitutes copyright infringement may have to change their philosophy. I’m not saying I have, yet it’s a saving technological grace to be able to full realize a song in studio quality to save time and money. The fairest thing that could happen is for Suno to pay a small fee to the IP they use to help musicians and songwriters. Considering Suno is likely already making a bundle just on subscriptions and community use, they could arguably afford that.

Courts are still trying to mull this over as lawsuits pile up. One could argue that when existing IP is stirred into a large digital pot, it becomes something else. When it helps a songwriter like me turn a written song into a professional studio version, it’s actually becoming a reciprocal process in helping musicians. 

This is why I now consider Suno as a worthy creative assistant and nothing more. Also, I fully intend for these Suno-made studio cuts of my songs to be promotional tools in enticing a real (hopefully notable) singer to record them. Not that you can’t just sample your own voice into the system and turn the singer into something sounding like yourself. I just haven’t done this yet since the first take with the male AI singer was right on the money.

I’ll promote the song on this blog once I get it onto SoundCloud. After that, I’ll be looking into DistroKid, ASCAP or BMI, plus a mechanical rights organization (or an MLC). This entire business side setup is the new way forward if deciding to stream your own songs on streaming outlets and protect your work.

My Future Use of Suno Pro

Other songs are in the pipeline from yours truly. This includes a Christmas song that’s about done at time of this writing. That one will be a mix of Gospel-Rock and Hip-Hop. It’ll officially be my second single to group up with “Whispered Thoughts” on streaming outlets this fall.

Two other songs should follow before end of the year. One, a Country-Blues song, and the other with a Dance-Pop vibe. Latter will be a new lyrical approach in having an AI bot lamenting a relationship in a love song. 

Suno Pro will probably be used for all these in creating studio-worthy versions. My only reservations are the mounting lawsuits against Suno for using existing music and vocal properties. Should it start mounting even further, it’s possible Suno would have to shut down—or I’d look into other options. 

From now on, though, I plan to envision AI as a helpful assistant rather than assume everyone will use it as a complete creative crutch. Not that I’ll completely back down from the potential dangers of AI in taking away from human endeavors. The problem is, when handed everything, humans are going to become lazy and let the bots take over as much as possible. Many corporations are doing this now, and it doesn’t always go over or end well.

In the realm of songwriting, it’s all the more important for a human to create songs and bring out the depth of that artist’s soul. Just try letting Suno create a song for you, and you’ll immediately be able to tell the difference. That’s especially true in the realm of lyrics, something I write and hone as well.

I go forward now with the theme of this blog still intact, but with a better formed philosophy built on where AI should go and where it needs to be cut off. Whether Suno continues being a part of that remains an unknown as the complications of IP law and other opinions from other users still pend. 

In Part 11, I’ll continue my look at Suno and a recent lawsuit against them from German company GEMA in the app using copyrighted recordings for AI training. It could lead to fast changes in how even AI-assisted songs are viewed or put together.

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Part 6: Is AI-Made Music Irresistible to Humans, or Being Consciously Shunned?

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No doubt some of you (and many others) never thought AI-produced songs would become big hits on influential music charts. And yet, there’s been two AI-made songs that went to #1 on two fairly big charts in the last six months of this writing. One is “Walk My Walk” by Breaking Rust on Billboard’s Country Digital Song sales. This one alone is considered the first instance of an AI song hitting numero uno on anything owned by Billboard. The second one is “Celebrate Me” by IngaRose on global iTunes charts at the beginning of this year. 

While no AI song has made it to #1 on any mainstream Billboard chart yet, it doesn’t count others that came close. Various others have hit the Top Ten over the last year, albeit on niche music charts and, again, not on Billboard.

Still, the news of the ones charting that high made big news on social media. It made even skeptics begin to speculate on what could happen if AI creations continue making headway in the mainstream music industry. But, it may also send a new signal at what’s soon to happen based on a recent report saying music listeners are beginning to reject AI music creations.

This hasn’t stopped people from making AI songs. There was even an instance of a songwriter who reported that his unfinished song was stolen by an AI creator, completed, and posted on a streaming service.

It’s news like this that might be the final straw for music creators and fans. But it’s time to look at the reality of whether the music industry can control AI taking over things (like the Oscars now will for movies), or if it’s too late to prevent a turn of the tide. The outcome may involve the sheer will of the public at large.

Is There Really a Soul in AI-Produced Music?

I’ll admit that I listened to the songs listed above for research, and they were not bad. The AI artist IngaRose, in particular, had a voice all music industry labels and producers look for in ways of standing out. But, reality is reality. A digitally produced voice still has a way about it that just feels empty when listened to more intently. It’s everything to do with sincerity in whether you truly believe in what the artist is singing about. There’s a humanness to sincerity in singing that even far too many human singers don’t have.

Beyond that, there’s also a new psychological aspect to AI singers—in that if a listener is told it’s AI, they’re more apt to feel…well, cheated. It seems your fellow human ultimately wants fellow humans to express themselves in music as a form of an artistic gift. 

The above comes from a recent study citing a decline in listening to music produced by AI, most notably in the coveted Gen Z and Alpha categories. As reported, it seems there’s a chain reaction to that in some major artists penning an open letter saying “Say No to Suno.” With the latter AI software being a leader in producing AI music, it’s possible avid fans of those artists agree with the AI issue and began turning their backs.

Others are saying AI is even using cultural appropriation, as in black music being digitally generated while mimicking fake life pains. Yeah, it’s a reminder the real human struggle is where the true magic is in the best music produced over the last 100 years. 

Worst of this is the knowledge that AI apps like Suno are also taking away from royalty rights of real artists. With many listening to music to inspire creating music of their own, the realization that AI could take that away (along with basic jobs) is a beacon for a possible approaching backlash. 

So, I pose a bigger question: Are we going to see AI back off in the music industry due to much of the public hating it? What that looks like is also in question as AI corporations continue to push it hard on the public, whether people want it or not.

What Would Happen with an AI Music Industry Pushback?

The biggest problem isn’t so much how much the public rejects AI in music. It’s in how far AI companies continue to push it out there as a piece of digital candy. Even if some people reject AI-produced music, it’s going to keep happening as the technology gets better and there’s pirates out there willing to use it for maximum moneymaking.

We could see an eventual public division in the world over rejecting AI and those who embrace it all the way. And that almost looks biblical in scope if you consider how much AI could take over everything, including running the world in various significant ways. And it may, again, come down to the very point of this blog: Can human creativity prevail rather than be fragmented to its own minority existence in our world? 

It all comes down to the temperament of people and what they do. In the immediate term, there may be an AI burnout phase where people reject creative things done by AI. Once AI becomes more refined, it may be too good to resist for a large amount of our world population. 

Regardless, most people seem to be reawakened to the very idea behind music of all types. And that is, human pain and expression are what make good songs/performances. There’s an aura there people can feel that’s almost ineffable, yet clearly present. The palpable science behind this may be the next big discovery to prove what makes a human creation more compelling. 

Many people also don’t want to be cheated of that aura. Perhaps they’re still being fooled by it—then changing their minds on support when told it’s AI. It’s why it’s important now that streaming services officially tell us what’s created by AI and what isn’t. Not all are, so AI continuing to encroach on the music industry would have to be a great deception to continue growing. 

Don’t be surprised if said deception grows larger when big money is at stake. The good news, at least, is that (through the above study anyway), humans want real humans to express themselves musically. If their bullshit detectors are always on full force, we’ll continue to hear real performers creating their own songs and making awesome performances.

Yes, but is the Music Talent Pool Growing Thin?

Sure, the argument can be made we don’t have the type of musical artists we once saw. Those who get pushed to the mainstream are sometimes mediocre and don’t express themselves as compellingly as prior generational artists did. 

In this case, AI can create faux artists who bring that type of expression back. I’ll admit the AI artists I heard seemed to express themselves deeper, even if clearly infringing by being an amalgam of great artists from long ago or the recent past. 

What’s needed is supporting the artists out there who really express themselves with sincerity in a song. Far too many don’t get the support they need by the public due to lack of promotion. With the threat of AI taking away those individuals, the best thing that can happen is just more acute awareness of would could happen. Plus, since millions of real people would love to make legit money in the music business, the sheer will of the public may be the future—uh, AI unplugging.

In Part 7, I’m going to look at how AI creative assistants seem to be imitating a mix of existing content available online. Is it really copyright infringement when it’s a mix of everything ever created? 

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