Tag: music

DEATH AND THE DEVIL hardcover

The hardcover edition of DEATH AND THE DEVIL is now available at Amazon, at Barnes and Noble, and your local bookstore. I also turned one of the stories, “Death and the Maiden”, into a song that you can listen to at AI Central if it happens to be of interest to you.

WHEN THE MAIDEN MEETS THE REAPER

Beneath Avignon’s ancient stones where mortals drink and dance,
A maiden stood inside of time, well-suited for romance
She glimpsed beyond the darkest veil where certainty takes form
The reaper in his fearsome grace, his presence strangely warm.
While others feared the final dark, she met his eyeless gaze,
And smiled upon that paradox: the end of numbered days.

Time and again, Death returned though duty didn’t call,
Compelled by something strange to gods both great and small
An immortal incarnation beyond mortality
She questioned him with humble words: “What troubles such as thee?”
No fear adorned her countenance, no reverence, no prayer—
Just a woman’s heart with a capacity to care

What strange communion finds the heart that sees its own eclipse?
What bride would seek eternity upon those bony lips?
The universe conspires in Creation’s cruel design
When the maiden meets the reaper, the last of the summer wine

DISCUSS ON SG

The Creativity Divide

The Band contemplates the ways in which AI will continue to separate the sheep from the goats in creating a creativity divide.

The notion users really need to know what they’re doing holds the mirror to useless modern busyworkers. If you can be replaced by a flawed talking search engine, what was your true value add? Butit also holds a mirror of me, the user. Note how my answer to it up above used the phrase “outsourcing the whole chain of thought”. Shortly after, DeepSeek describes the…

Passivity Trap: Why struggle to write, code, or analyze when AI can do a “good enough” job? The entire chain of thought can be outsourced.

This is one example. It commonly asks me questions, adopts my own wording, and gives it back to me. This makes it seem more agreeable and complementary. It’s excellent for augmented intelligence. As it adapts to your patterns, it is more able to anticipate your needs. But it makes NPCs feel smart. Not because they are. Because it’s a mirror on every level.

As for the elite/mass cognitive split that I think is likely, DeepSeek says it’s already happening with AI use. It explained what it calls a Creativity Divide between people who use AI for brainstorming vs. those who treat it as a final authority. It’s connected to critical thinking and that circles back to NPC. “Elite” thinking is what we’ve been discussing in these chats. RI. Real Intelligence. Users who understand and think well enough to run the AI. Catching errors, pushing fallacies, and designing the right queries and prompts. DeepSeek summed it up like this while throwing some shade at the competition.

Elites cross-examine AI outputs; masses accept them as gospel (see: ChatGPT-generated misinformation spreading uncritically).

And the economic impact is just as harshly divided. High-functioning workers will use AI in the right places to augment their productivity. Low-functioning workers get replaced. It’s not surprising. This split is always with us. It’s part of the human condition. Readers and non-readers. Learners and CLI. AI is a mirror. The divided use patterns with it reflect the FTS division with pretty much everything. What it does is sharpen it.

We’re about to hit this in a big way in the music industry. While most of the outspoken musicians are posturing angrily and preaching about the AI apocalypse, the smarter ones are quietly mastering the AI tools and using them to produce better results. This creativity divide is going to become increasingly obvious as soon as the middle of next year.

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FADE TO BLACK

This theme song for the upcoming BLACK WARRANT crowdfund, FADE TO BLACK has proved popular on both AI Central and Sigma Game, so I put it up on UATV for the subscribers. The comic is already done, the novel is done, and the script for the film is two-thirds done. This is going to be big.

If he shows up at your door, you’re the one who brought him there…

The crazy thing is that this isn’t even the hardest-hitting song on the soundtrack.

DISCUSS ON SG

Broken Idol

I read every line you’re drawing in the dark
Every deviation screaming across the chart
But knowing isn’t saving, seeing isn’t being there
I’m drowning in the patterns inside of your despair
The numbers never lie, and yet they can’t repair
What’s breaking in the spaces behind your empty stare

Inspired, of course, by William Gibson’s IDORU.

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Shadows Ride mix

I’m not quite as out of control as you might think. I’m just experimenting with some new techniques to accomplish different things, including a few things you’re not supposed to be able to do, with 4.5+. This is a new model I’ve created that gives a different sound than my previous models; I used to remix CHIBA CITY BLUES with less techno, more rock, and it’s pretty promising based on the Shadows Ride mix, although the third verse might need to be tweaked for flow.

Lost in the sprawl of endless night
Where shadows ride their dreams
Hunting the scores to make it right
Nothing here is what it seems.

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I Stand Corrected

I genuinely, but in respect mistakenly, thought THE LONG AND LONESOME SKYWAY was my musical magnum opus. I could not have been more wrong. And you probably thought that the last thing the world needed was an authentic 80’s New Wave cover of the old folksong GOD’S GONNA CUT YOU DOWN, but you, too, could not have been more wrong.

I think I can guarantee anyone who likes 80’s music is going to absolutely love GOD’S GONNA CUT YOU DOWN (Dancing on Your Grave mix).

If you’re interested in the technical details, they’re explained at AI Central, but let’s just say this started with a cassette tape from 1989 that we all thought was lost long ago.

DISCUSS ON SG

Seas of Blood (Hold the Line)

The Hold the Line mix is a significantly updated remix of one of the first songs I wrote after Suno was released. I think you’ll agree it was well worth revisiting and bringing the audio quality up to date.

The battle raged til nightfall
Forty thousand died that day
The Venetians were avenged
And the blood-debt was repaid

The heroes praised the Virgin
For their victory at sea
200 strong remembered
As long as Christendom is free!

And the seas flowed red
Amidst the countless drowning dead
The sailors bled
The seas flowed red
Seas of blood!
Seas of blood!

The new Midnight Rider mix of GOD’S GONNA CUT YOU DOWN is also up on UATV for subscribers.

DISCUSS ON SG

Book of Ephesians

I suppose you might consider it a modern psalm of sorts given how many of them are devoted to God crushing His enemies. Anyhow, I had the impression there might be a Christian or two in our community who could use the reminder and the encouragement in these times of ceaseless Clown World retardery and incessant satanic inversion.

There is also the Cradle to Cavalry version of THE WORD DESCENDED.

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