Janosch Troehler

It was an earthquake not seen before. In late 2022, OpenAI publicly launched ChatGPT. It became the fastest-growing consumer application ever, attracting 100 million active users in just two months—a mindboggling accomplishment. In comparison, it took popular social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram nine months and 2.5 years, respectively, to reach that number of users.

Artificial intelligence is here to stay, and we can hardly foresee how it will disrupt professions and society. However, the exponential improvements we see frighten even those closest to the technology's development. As a result, many leading experts call for a stop of development—or at least a slow-down.

But beneath the public hype around image generators like Dall-E or Midjourney, AI applications like SoundRaw are already impacting the music industry significantly. It seems like the music business is experiencing its next «Napster moment»—but on steroids.

AI Already Drives The Industry Today

It's worth noting that artificial intelligence has already heavily driven the music business for some years. As a critical actor, Spotify has implemented arguably the best curation and recommendation engines in the streaming business. These forms of AI that we also know from social media platforms are generally described as Curation AI.

And it continues to iterate on its AI integrations, launching a new AI DJ in February. And it won't be the end of the road for features in the coming months—especially now basically the whole world can create plugins with ChatGPT.

Curation AI also impacts how songs are written and performed. In contemporary pop songs, lengthy intros are gone; you need to hook people as quickly as possible. The skip button to the next track is near.

However, while Curation AI comes with its own challenges (but not necessarily in music), generative AI, also called Creation AI, like ChatGPT, is an entirely different beast. Vall-E, for example, is a voice-generating AI that can replicate a voice from just a 3-second snippet.

Now, anybody can create songs with the voice of a famous artist—dead or alive. And yes, there are a lot out there already. Some of them are fun, like Eminem rapping about cats.

Others are outstanding, like the fake song Winters Cold with an AI-generated voice of Drake.

Abundant Legal, Ethical, And Philosophical Questions

For almost 15 years, Thomas Seidmann, Samuel Birrer, and Simon Pfister have been on their musical journey. But in 2018, they came to a crossroads that would determine their future: A change of sonic style, a new name, followed by initial success.

As Yet No Yokai, hailing from Lucerne, Switzerland, the trio won the prestigious m4music Demotape Clinic category «Rock» with their song Fahrenheit and singed with Hummus Records.

After releasing a first EP, Post Apocalyptic Promenade, PT. 2, in 2018, they followed up with an array of singles like Vagus, Yet No Yokai's first entry into Weekly5 in 2020.

In some ways, the long-awaited debut Wir Sind Da undermines a nostalgia-tainted understanding of how one creates a rock song but simultaneously offers us a way forward for the genre.

At its core, Yet No Yokai's songs originated in a romantic, old-fashioned way: jam sessions. So one would assume that the band ended with final compositions through refinements and clean-ups. But that couldn't be further from the truth.

A couple of weeks ago, «riser» was publicly introduced. It's a non-profit association run by established players of Switzerland's music business that set out to highlight local up-and-coming artists. In two different formats, newcomer bands would get the chance to prove themselves on stage.

On May 25, they held the first event of their «riser.AMP» series in Zurich's Exil Club. The promise of the format sounds intriguing:

«Established artists and bands choose two young up-and-coming artists and create a show together. The rising artists are not overshadowed but are part of a joint performance.»

But, however intriguing the promise, it's also rather vague. And you could define two factors that decide the format's success or failure:

• How many people show up?
• What does the joint performance look like?

Preemptively said: One of these two has significant room for improvement.

Spot-on Selection

There are enough reasons to be sceptical about «riser». The main question floating around my head as I walked in the concrete valleys of Western Zurich was: Will there be enough people?

The established artist of the first «riser.AMP», Jack Stoiker's punk rock band Knöppel, had to nominate two up-and-coming bands. And their selection was spot on: Mamba Bites and Fluffy Machine, both hailing from the French part of Switzerland.

Knöppel, the unlikely phenomenon that found unexpected popularity with their 2016 album Hey Wichsers (Engl: Hey Wankers), are still surfing on that wave despite having released Faszination Glied (Engl: Fascination Penis) in 2019 and working on a new record scheduled for this year.

Their peak might be relatively long ago, but Knöppel still manage to draw crowds in—so «riser.AMP» could deliver on their promise towards the newcomers: The club was packed.

The Rising Stars Deliver

Mamba Bites and Fluffy Machine delivered. Mamba Bites, an all-female trio, immediately generated pressure, playing unapologetically loud. The club's sound system screeched. But beneath their rampant, aggressive noise, you could detect sophistication in refined composition. Just take the climactic final stretch of Temporary Nature.

And just as I thought it was a shame that it still feels quite unusual to see women conjuring such ecstatic punk punches, the bass player lifted the instrument over her head, revealing the message: «More women on stage.»

Later, the surf punkers from Fluffy Machine demonstrated how only a couple of years more experience could add to a performance. So, while Mamba Bites released their first demo in 2020, Fluffy Machine published their debut, It's Funny Cause He's Fat, in 2017 and played quite extensively in the UK.

Fluffy Machine are natural entertainers and jokesters who are as confident as they are self-aware and ironic. They know that they're creating party music—and embrace it fully. Yet, despite their joking attitude, they're professionals, able to play with relaxed cool. With their latest two singles, nah nah nah and i'm always high (when i see you smile), they also demonstrated their potential to craft addictive hymns.

And after these talented musicians riled up the audience and filled the Exil club with a smell of stale beer, sweat and farts, Knöppel took the stage and seemed hilariously amateurish. Yet, their cult hits, driven by simplistic three chords and Jack Stoiker's absolutely amelodic voice, are just a blueprint of punk's spirit.

Not Creative Enough

Usually, I would conclude: It was a perfect punk rock night. Loud music, pogo, beer, exuberance. You can't wish for much more.

However, regarding the vague outline of the format and its promise of a «joint performance», the evening didn't live up to its potential.

Daniel Mittag, aka Jack Stoiker, and his bandmate Marc Jenny on Contrabass introduced each of the rising artists' performances. They played one song and then let the new generation take the stage.

While these interludes are out of the ordinary, it wasn't enough to make the evening feel different from a traditional show. Knöppel still were undoubtedly the headliner catching the spotlight—and Mamba Bites and Fluffy Machine did their best to convince. So in a sense, they were probably overshadowed.

Why not split Knöppel's set: Three songs in the beginning, middle, and end? Or an actual collective performance? Or Knöppel covering a track from both bands? The punk rock theme lends itself perfectly to creative, maybe weird, but lovable ideas.

Admittedly, those suggestions come with many complications and additional effort in preparation and production, especially considering it's a one-off.

Moreover, it's a fine line: How creative can you get without scaring away the audience? How can you manage the fan's expectations regarding the established act—and how much can you subvert them? After all, it's hard to convince people to check out newcomers, as was again made aware when the «Strom & Drang» festival had to cut one whole day because of devastatingly low pre-sales.

However, it's too soon to draw a definitive conclusion after only one event, and the first one at that. While «riser.AMP» might not have delivered fully on all their promises, the most important thing was that Mamba Bites and Fluffy Machine could showcase their talent to Zurich's audience while receiving fair compensation.