This review was commissioned. However, it bears no weight on the score or decision. All reviews are written from an unbiased standpoint.
Talking about AI in music in the electronic scene right now can have you strung up on a cross and hailed as the most evil thing since…Since the concept of evil began. But I’m a defender of AI use in music; I think that there’s something to be gained from AI. Whether it’s a prompt, elements that can be used in art, or a foundation for a song that can be expanded upon it’s pretty cool. And, yeah, there’s always the fear that AI will takeover EVERYTHING, but I highly doubt that will happen in the long run. People still need a face to cling to, most of the time. Then again, I might be proven wrong one day.
This is all funneling down into the topic of discussion today which is Nature of Wires’ brand-new album “Digital Silence”. Gary of NoW explained his process to me and it’s actually pretty dope. After discovering an AI group online he was fascinated how quickly music could be created with just a few simple prompts, but noted how piss poor the quality of the song was and how the mix sounded awful, so on and so forth. What’s to be expected, in other words.
Gary took the base of the song and rebuilt it into his own style, restructuring it as he pleased. A remix of an AI song, or a complete reimagination, or maybe a bit of both? Regardless of the answer he continued onwards. The last piece of the puzzle were the vocals. Gary never shied away from his vocal weakness going on to and thus used the final bit of AI to create a vocal persona named Lukacs Asoniu. This all begs the question: how did it turn out? The answer is this: better than most of the other industrial I receive in my inbox.
“Digital Silence” is much more rough than previous Nature of Wires entries. ‘Dark Waters’ is an excellent starting point and breathes life into a hard dancefloor single. Synthpop melodies with a rougher touch to it, blending EBM beats for extra stumpiness. The vocals are mediocre, but fit the song. Robotic, almost sounding like something that would be in an aggrotech project’s repertoire. They fit, but only just.
The broad description of ‘Dark Waters’, which is hard dancefloor music with a synthpop twist, can be used as the theme for the rest of the album albeit with differing touches. For example, ‘Under the Radar’ has a bit of house influence found within while ‘The Day It All Changed’ (one of my personal favorites) gives out harder electronic riffs and drum’n’bass conundrums.
Other songs such as ‘Under the Radar’ take further inspiration from electronic dance music blending in brighter synthpop melodies with the stomp-tastic beats while tracks such as ‘The Day It All Changed’ give out harder riffs and drum’n’bass conundrums.
Now this does bring my attention to the vocals. My opinion on them is that they are a degree better than what I normally hear in industrial music but not by much. At least with an AI voice there’s a tune that can be carried; a lot of industrial musicians think they can sing but they just really…Can’t. Gary’s being honest, saying he can’t sing, so he brought in the help of a robot. That being said there’s a severe lack of personality throughout the album and the vocals are buried in layers of digital touches. Again, reminiscing aggrotech / hellektro stuff. As I usually say, serviceable but not much more than that. I can’t help but feel that if Gary went back and contracted a few of his previous collaborators the album would have been better.
Summarizing the whole album I once again bring in Gary’s voice, “Rightly or wrongly AI is here to stay, but it should be used to enhance rather than to replace I think.” He’s doing the AI thing mostly right. Using it as a base for inspiration and then completely rebuilding from the ground up. The vocals definitely need work, unfortunately. Again, this is a common complaint I have with most bands in the industrial scene so this isn’t any different. Get some good vocal collabs again and I think you’ll have gold on your hands.
