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MTV Music Generator Helped Create Chart Music

Posted by simoniker on from the who'd-have-thunk-it? dept.

sharph writes "A band called Boomkat, made up of Kellin Manning and his sister Taryn, use the Playstation game MTV Music Generator to sketch out songs before re-recording them. Here's a NY Times article about it (Yeah, free reg. required.) Their first single, "The Wreckoning", got to No. 24 on the US pop charts. Interesting read."

18 comments

  1. PC Sequencers by Peapod · · Score: 0

    Seems like it'd be simpler to use basic PC sequencers, but impressive nonetheless.

    Not if you don't have one (a PC that is).

    -Peapod

  2. Yep. by MattCohn.com · · Score: 1

    Consumer grade stuff is often used in the planning of something big. Now if they actually recorded something off that and burned it right to CD, that would be a little more frightening. Oh, and on a personal note to slashdot, ARG! MY EYES! This purple on black theme?!

  3. Make Your Own Video by ShaoK · · Score: 3, Funny

    Let's hope they don't start making videos only using console games.

    1. Re:Make Your Own Video by Tsuzuki · · Score: 1

      Well, Music and Music 2000 (by Codemasters) used to let you make movies to go with your music.... however, since it was on a Playstation and it's got barely any RAM, you'd find that you could create stuff to a certain point and then it would just crash. It was all kinda crappy ambient-techno-look effects video anyway...

  4. activex/smil by Rares+Marian · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    What the hell do you use to play?

    In Windows?
    In Linux?
    Anybody?

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    The message on the other side of this sig is false.
    1. Re:activex/smil by Rares+Marian · · Score: 0

      I was looking for help. How is that off topic?

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  5. Google News link: by Rellik66 · · Score: 1

    Google News link, no registration required.

    --

    Too many zeros, not enough ones

  6. Quality of Chart Music? by xyrw · · Score: 1

    The fact that such generated music can make it onto the charts is telling about the quality of MTV hits in general, no?

    Try generating Mozart.

    1. Re:Quality of Chart Music? by Alizarin+Erythrosin · · Score: 1

      Actually I've heard the song and it isn't bad... but then again, I like techno/electronica music anyways.

      --
      There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
    2. Re:Quality of Chart Music? by j1mmy · · Score: 1

      You have no idea what techno/electronica is. Pick any major pop act from the last two decades and I can almost guarantee that the "band" consists mostly of synths. This one is no different, and is really best described as rock or something.

    3. Re:Quality of Chart Music? by WWWWolf · · Score: 1
      The fact that such generated music can make it onto the charts is telling about the quality of MTV hits in general, no?

      Well, the program was used to "sketch" the music, which sort of implies that they didn't do it all the way on the program.

      If the chart-topping single would have been made from beginning to end within the generator using nothing but pre-packaged samples, that might have been far more worrying.

      Try generating Mozart.

      ::spills coffee when listening to a cool .mod remix of Bach's Toccata and Fugue::

  7. Now we just need... by metamatic · · Score: 3, Funny

    ..."MTV Music Listener", and we can cut humans out of the loop entirely and save untold billions of brain cells.

    --
    GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
    1. Re:Now we just need... by phlack · · Score: 1

      But if the computer contains more than one CPU, will the RIAA demand that the song be purchased twice?

  8. Console controller as instrument by adso · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This brings up an interesting point. One of the main struggles in learning a musical instrument is essentially learning the interface- being able to get to the point where you don't have to look at where your fingers are to get the notes you want. A few hours with any good button-masher on a console will get you to this point with the controller, and after playing through several games, this becomes second nature. The PS Controller has 16 game play buttons (I'm counting 8 for the direction pad) and consider how often many of you have been hunched over the booklet "reading" the notation for a fighting game and punching the buttons for a certain move without looking. This is certainly analogous to reading music. It would seem natural to pop a music-generating program in and be able to hit the ground running once the "moves" are figured out.

    1. Re:Console controller as instrument by AvitarX · · Score: 1

      I think your premiss is very flawed.

      To think that to learn the keyboard on a synth is any harder then learning where the keys are on a control pad is rediculous.

      The problem with playing music well is timing and the distortion their of (style). You must feel the music and have the timing perfect, but not quite their.

      I learned the fingering for the saxaphone in about 2 hours, I never became a good player because I have no feel for music.

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  9. Norwegian electronica group T�yen ... by 44strom · · Score: 1

    ... already did that last year:

    http://www.fuzzlogic.com/lunakafe/moon70/no70b.p hp

  10. What MTV Music Gen 2 actually IS... by 2Flower · · Score: 1

    ...is a loop sequencer. A loop can be any sound, a synth, a guitar, a drumline, a bassline, a vocal, name it. The program sequences the loops, lets you get nitty-gritty to make mini-melodies out of one shot sounds and use THOSE as loops, etc. It's like Acid Music but it can delve down a level.

    I've done plenty of music in MG2, and enjoyed it a lot. The hard part is getting a quality recording off your PS2, and IMPORTING loops from an external source. Nasty, and requires a special purpose sampler device. That's what in the end drove me to using a PC program to do a similar function (Acid Music).