p2pnet.net News:- Back in November, 2003, we ran an item on Polyphonic HMI (Human Media Interface), kicking off with, “You know those flat, thin squares of rubbery, yellow cheese – the stuff they sell in supermarkets and that you find on fast-food cheeseburgers? It’s been ‘processed’ for easy handling, packaging and distribution and tastes as flat and thin as it looks.”

Spain’s Polyphonic HMI (Human Medcia Interface) was, “doing the same thing with HSS – market-babble for ‘Hit Song Science’,” a system of mathematical music analysis it’s using for “individual music recommendation” and, “as a tool for the record industry”.

Well, it seems the corporate music brigade have taken it seriously, as have some performers bent on becoming STARS !!! but who can’t wait for natural selection to do its thing

“Martin and Ruth, aka Spike, the next big girl/boy duo (so they hope) add some synth and a new background vocal to the mix,” says the Guardian Unlimited.

“He saves the song and she emails it to Polyphonic Human Media Interface who, within 24 hours, will tell them whether their song will be a hit. When the results arrive they hover over the 20in screen and click on the returned mail. There is a graph, showing a cluster of many dots, like a constellation, and somewhere in the cluster a red spot.

“The spot marks their song, not quite a bullseye, but still in the throng. “It’s scored a seven,” Ruth says, scanning down. “We’re in. The record company will definitely meet us now.” Their future suddenly looks a lot rosier.”

Yes. Well.

But given that the Big Music cartel is interested only in music that can be cookie-cuttered and then churned out by the billions as physical CDs so crooks can pirate them, that doesn’t come as a big surprise.

Quantity, not quality, counts.

While no one’s talking about it, “it seems that the whole record industry is already using just this process,” says the story.

“From unsigned acts dreaming in their garage, to multinationals such as Sony and Universal, everyone is clandestinely using a new and controversial technology to gain an edge on their competitors. And just as with athletes and performance-enhancing drugs, there is a remarkable reluctance to talk about it. But the secret is out: the record biz, once that bastion of wayward creative flair, is succumbing to the plain old-fashioned science of statistical analysis.”

With Jimena Llopis as executive chairman, Mike McCready as ceo and Tracie Reed as vp, North America, Polyphonic HMI says failed musicians “might still be enjoying careers in music” had they but used HSS.

“Had HSS existed in 1966 and had Decca used it to evaluate a certain demo that arrived they may not have turn down the Beatles, whose music sounded very risky for the times,” it states.

It also says, “Our customers are the music labels but the beneficiaries of our work include the people who create, perform and consume music. The more healthy the industry is the more opportnities [sic] there are for everyone who hopes to make a career in music.”

With Big Music as the Big Customer, it’s no surprise to learn HSS doesn’t come cheap – €4,000 (more than $5,200) to score a finished CD, as the Guardian points out.

For $49.99, HSS, will decide if an individual musician’s tune has, “hit potential based on the mathematical characteristics of the music”.

Now, “please note that we will not be able to offer our promotional price of $50 per song report for much longer,” says the company’s “website for unsigned artists”.

“So be sure to take advantage of this offer and upload your songs this year.”

Plenty of hopefuls have forked out thousands of dollars for demos, and now here’s a new way for them to spend their cash.

“Does it sound like a hit song?” and “Can we promote it effectively?” – asks the “website for unsigned artists,” continuing:

“Using those two criteria and research tools such as focus groups and call-out research the industry has about a 20% success rate. That is, only one in five songs that get promoted ever chart.

“By adding a third criteria to the mix … Does it have optimal mathematical patterns? … we’ve achieved a 100% success rate with our label and producer customers of our professional service.”

The company doesn’t define “100% success,” or say either how it relates to “our label and producer customers,” or who they are.

But, “The service offered on this site can help you determine if your music has some of the patterns needed to become a hit song and you can use our reports to gain the attention of A&R professionals.”

Does it work? Could be. To an extent, at any rate.

But it does take the music out of music and at the end of the day, if a song is worth listening to, it’ll be heard somehow or other, that being particularly so now the Net has made it possible for anyone, anywhere, to play their compositions to music lovers around the world.

Big Music is trying desperately to keep things the way they used to be. But it’s failing.

This is the digital 21st century and talent, not stats, will decide who rises to the top.

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See:-
flat, thin squares – Music and processed cheese, p2pnet, November 23, 2005
big girl/boy duo – RIAA collapses INDUCE talks, p2pnet, October 8, 2004

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