r/aiMusic

I recently came across this survey on how music producers actually view and use AI music tools. I think it pretty interesting so wanted to share.

It was commissioned by Sonarworks and conducted by Sound On Sound. Over 70% of respondents are working professionals with more than a decade of experience, so it feels fairly credible and representative.

Current usage: About one in five are already regular AI users, nearly half are in the experimental stage, and fewer than 20% have no interest in AI at all.

Biggest concerns: Over a third worry that using AI would compromise their creative identity. Almost as many have ethical concerns,  particularly regarding copyright and training data legalit. And more than a quarter feel current AI tools do not yet meet professional quality standards.

Where they're most open to AI: Close to three-fifths are on board with AI handling repetitive technical tasks like vocal tuning, drum editing, and file management. Acceptance drops significantly when it comes to AI making creative decisions.

Views on the future: Only 3.6% think AI is a passing fad, and nearly a third believe it's already revolutionizing the industry. 58% see AI eventually settling into a supportive role, with humans keeping creative control.

The part I found most interesting: Jazz, blues, and classical music are seen as the hardest genres for AI to replicate, while EDM and mainstream pop are considered the easiest for AI to generate and replicate.

https://www.soundonsound.com/music-business/ai-music-tech-2026

Lately, I’ve been going through a really silent and heavy period in my life. I lost my job, and the current market is incredibly brutal. It brings a lot of daily anxiety, confusion, and a deep sense of isolation. Even though people around me offer words of encouragement, at the end of the day, you're still the one who has to face the quiet battle alone.

During one of those stressful nights, while trying to keep my mind from spinning out of control, I stumbled upon AI music.

I don't have a formal background in music, and I don't play any instruments. But I realized that taste and instinct can be their own kind of creative skill. I started using these tools to pour my bottled-up frustrations and raw emotions into lyrics, shaping a dark, heavy, baritone folk-rock sound that matches what I feel inside.

I know making money from this is unrealistic, and honestly, I don't even care about the views anymore. For me, these tracks have become a personal time capsule. A late-night record that proves I refused to break when things got dark.

I just wanted to share my story and ask this community—what is your personal reason for using AI? Is it just a hobby for you, or has it become a way to cope when the real world gets too heavy?

And I don't mean that as a bad thing. We got busy lives, it's fun to make up characters and have them sing songs and stuff. The image and video models are fun (but $$$$). Some of the songs end up pretty good. Batman is pretend too. People like Batman. I listen to my music all the time.

People want to be quick to moralize it. "ITS THEFT/COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT!" Maybe in your head, but not under current law. Anyway 🏴‍☠️ "YOU'RE NOT A REAL ARTIST!" Who cares? lol. The whole point is being a fake artist. I'd rather be a fake artist with songs than a real one without 'em.

I'm fairly new to producing music, and I'm doing my best writing my own lyrics and then using AI to produce it because unfortunately, like many people here, I don't have the kind of money to actually produce it.

Every time I'm really excited to share my music, i see these videos where people are spreading so much hate about ai music, which immediately discourages me.

How do you find the will to keep creating music despite all the hate out there?

i'm mainly a lyricist, and pretty clumsy on the production side of things. I've got notebooks full of lyrics, but getting them into an actual Ableton project is where I always get stuck. Staring at the blank grid, trying to build a vibe from scratch just to match the words... I usually just give up.

So I've been messing with the AI generators like everyone else. I plugged some lyrics into Suno, and yeah, it was fun hearing a full song pop out. For my friends who don't produce, it's a blast. They can make a funny birthday song in a minute. It's an amazing toy.

but for my own stuff, after the initial 'wow' factor, I just felt stuck. It gives you this one audio file, and that's it. The vocals are baked in, the mix is what it is. If I want to change the bass sound or add a different drum fill, I can't. It's a closed box.

After hitting that wall a few times, I realized what I actually needed wasn't something that finishes the song for me. its something that just helps me get started. My frustration led me to a few different types of tools, and I feel like they fall into two camps:

1. The 'Black Box' Toys:

This is where I'd put Suno and Udio. They're great for a quick, fun result and for people who don't touch DAWs. You give it a prompt, it gives you a finished thing. But for anyone who wants to actually *produce*, it's kind of a dead end.

2. The Workflow Tools:

These feel different because they're designed to hand control back to you. For example:

Mureka Co: This one connects to Ableton. I can tell it "give me a sad indie-pop loop at 110 BPM" and it generates the tracks directly in my project. The stems it makes are honestly pretty generic (and the UI is kinda clunky), but it gets me from a blank page to an editable 8-bar loop. I can immediately start swapping out the sounds or rewriting the bassline. It's more of a sophisticated starting point than a final product.

Stem Splitters (like LALAL.AI): These are on the same wavelength. They aren't generative, but they're built for producers. They let you take an existing track and break it apart so you can actually work with the pieces.

I guess my point is, the whole 'AI is taking our jobs' conversation feels a bit misguided. The 'black box' stuff isn't a threat to producers because it isn't even playing the same game. The real change is probably going to come from the workflow tools that let us skip the most boring parts of the process.

has anyone read this book??? appeared on my amazon 'things you might like' and just read it... im not sure how to feel about it 😂 i think its just changed the way i do EVERYTHING music related.....wondered if anyone else has read it yet....

https://preview.redd.it/d57ks3c9232h1.png?width=930&format=png&auto=webp&s=639fb4de09c01c043ea86791ab37d89cb6988336

scary....but.....amazing???

I run a YouTube channel where I post AI-generated music and MVs, mostly using tools like Suno and Musicful, and lately I’ve been thinking about something a lot.

With traditional music, there are so many layers where feedback naturally exists. People can comment on the performance, vocal delivery, arrangement, mixing, sound design, emotion, timing, all that stuff. Even if someone isn’t a musician, they can still say “the vocals feel flat” or “the drums are too busy” or “the chorus hits harder than the verse.”

But with AI music, most of those layers either disappear or become invisible.

There’s no real performer to critique, no instrumentalist making expressive choices, no vocalist intentionally controlling emotion or phrasing, and usually no detailed production process people can actually analyze. Even if you wrote the lyrics yourself, that’s still only one part of the final output and honestly lyrics alone don’t always get much feedback in regular music either.

So I’ve been wondering what kind of feedback people actually expect in AI music communities now.

A lot of the time the only response AI music gets is basically “it’s AI,” which usually isn’t useful feedback at all. It just turns into a negative reaction instead of actual musical discussion.

And the funny part is, even human-made music with tons of real creative effort behind it often gets almost no meaningful feedback either.

So I guess my question is: in AI music communities like this, what does “useful feedback” even look like anymore?

Someone on r/aiMusic issued a challenge to make a musically bad song on Suno, which is indeed difficult.

Their point was that the engine defaults to making generic music that is neither good nor bad. I had fun fighting it to generate a pretty awful song. Even learned some music theory in the process.

Anyway... Let's have some challenges!

Either drop me a request, or make your own challenge post and link it here. I'd like to try new things that I didn't think of myself as an exercise to explore the engine. I bet others could benefit from it too.

(I usually write my own lyrics, so I may not get to all, but I'll try to go first come first serve unless I'm really stuck or really inspired.)

Hey Everyone,

Tired mixing lounge, swing, and electronic elements. Let me know what you think. Thanks!

I've been using Mureka seriously ever since someone recommended it to me. With the V9 update just dropping, here's my honest take.

The vocal improvement in V9 is significant: breathing, vocal tails, and emotional delivery all feel a lot more natural. The overall mix is cleaner too, with noticeably better separation between drums, bass, and the main melody. Of course, it still don't quite match the realism and naturalness found in Suno or Udio.

The credits burn through really fast though so the value for money doesn't come close to Suno. And the Cover feature is pretty inconsistent too (honestly I haven't found a cover tool that really nails it yet).

Its vocal system is similar to Suno, I can upload own voice as a model. Probably because it also has TTS, the voice cloning is actually pretty solid.

But the thing I think is most worth paying attention to is Agent Studio. It's not prompt-based creation, literally chat with AI and adjust the structure. Even the Easy mode has switched to a conversational format now, giving me options to choose from along the way.

What's interesting is that Suno previously launched a chat feature in beta (Although it has now closed), and MiniMax is building out its agent ecosystem too. There are also tools that were built around conversational creation from day one, like Tunee and Tunesona. Feels like the agent direction is going to be the next major trend for AI music tools.