I generally find music made with generative AI to be offensively boring, especially the outputs of Suno. So I’m having a bit of a tough time processing the fact that I actually quite enjoy 1010Benja’s “Semiramis’ Dream.”
Benja has been unapologetic about his use of generative AI on his latest EP. But the opener explodes out of the speakers with a jungle beat and Benja’s incredible, obviously human voice front and center. You’d be forgiven for not immediately realizing that the song is the product of Suno. It lacks many of the dead giveaways. Even the most obviously AI part of the song — the choir of backup vocalists — is easily camouflaged amidst the hyperpop-influenced rapid-fire chops. Heavily processed and artificial-sounding vocals are a staple of many modern pop genres and, by leaning into that uncanniness, Benja is able to mask their origins.
But Benja isn’t hiding. He told Hearing Things: “My friend Patrick Holder did the beat. I recorded the vocals. Then we fed Suno the elements, settled on something, brought it out, edited it on Ableton, and then put it back into Suno.” That deliberate, iterative process separates it from the rest of the Suno slop out there. Benja estimates he did this a few hundred times for the track, writing his own lyrics and working with collaborators to perform the music before ever touching the AI.
While professing to be agnostic about his tools, Benja doesn’t pretend generative AI comes without ethical baggage. He acknowledges the environmental damage but says we can’t stop greedy corporations or put the genie back in the bottle. The only reason he’s using gen at all, he argues, is because his visions are currently far beyond his means. “I haven’t paid rent last month, and I won’t pay rent this month,” he said. It’s hard not to empathize. Despite earning a coveted Best New Music from Pitchfork for Ten Total, he remains a struggling artist who has endured periods of homelessness. Still, there is little on “Semiramis’s Dream” sonically that couldn’t have been achieved without AI. A similar choir effect could be accomplished with layered performances and smart vocal processing. 1010Benja hasn’t converted me — I still remain deeply skeptical of AI art. But he has proven that, in the right hands, Suno doesn’t have to be a slop engine.
