Music once came from bodies. Even when abstracted by notation, stabilised by recording, or governed by algorithms, it still traced back — however distantly — to a human performance, a voice, or an intentional act. With AI‑generated music, that anchor finally dissolves.
Here, music no longer originates in an event. It is not captured, replayed, or curated. It is generated — produced directly as readiness, without prior coordination, without memory, and without occasion.
This is not a stylistic shift. It is an ontological one.
From Selection to Generation
Algorithmic curation governs readiness by choosing among existing recordings. AI systems go further. They produce musical material on demand, optimised for context, duration, affective profile, and functional outcome.
Nothing needs to have happened before. There is no performance behind the sound, no earlier coordination being replayed. Readiness is synthesised directly from statistical models and optimisation goals.
Music no longer returns. It appears.
Readiness Without Event
In live music, readiness emerges through shared timing. In recorded music, it is stabilised. In curated playlists, it is regulated. In AI‑generated music, readiness is eventless.
There is no moment of origin to point to, no occasion to remember, no body whose timing must be respected. What is produced is not a trace of coordination but a readiness profile assembled to specification.
Music ceases to be something that happens. It becomes something that operates.
The Collapse of Authorship
Authorship dissolves quietly here. There is no composer in the traditional sense, no performer, and often no recognisable work. Attribution becomes irrelevant because nothing is being expressed or remembered.
This is not because AI has intentions of its own, but because intention is no longer required. Readiness can now be generated without agency.
The question of meaning simply does not arise.
Music as Readiness Infrastructure
AI‑generated music is rarely meant to be listened to. It is meant to function. It accompanies labour, regulates attention, stabilises mood, and smooths transitions — often adapting continuously in response to behavioural feedback.
In this role, music becomes infrastructural. Like lighting or climate control, it modulates conditions rather than conveying content.
Readiness is no longer prepared for action. It is maintained as a background condition.
No Memory, No Return
Because AI‑generated music has no originating event, it also has no memory. There is nothing to return to, no canonical version, no shared recollection. Each generation replaces the last without residue.
This further weakens any remaining sense of musical community. Coordination no longer occurs across bodies or time, but within systems responding to individual states.
Music becomes solitary, adaptive, and forgettable by design.
Power After Meaning
The power exercised here does not operate through representation, ideology, or persuasion. It operates through calibration. By shaping readiness continuously and invisibly, AI‑generated music alters what actions feel possible, sustainable, or desirable.
This is governance beyond meaning — not because meaning has been refuted, but because it has been bypassed.
After Music
At this point, it is no longer clear that we are dealing with music at all. What remains is a technology for organising readiness directly, without event, without origin, and without interpretation.
Music, once a fleeting coordination of bodies, has become a mechanism within the broader management of possibility.
Whether this marks an endpoint or a threshold remains an open question. But the transformation is complete: readiness no longer waits to be gathered. It is generated.
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