The Beatles, a name that has left a legendary mark on music history, has once again returned to the public eye in a stunning way. Their new song "Now and Then" produced with the help of AI technology was shortlisted for the Grammy Award. This is not only a tribute to the band's own brilliant achievements, but also an exploration of the infinite possibilities of artificial intelligence in the field of music creation. The editor of Downcodes will give you an in-depth understanding of how this legendary band perfectly integrates AI technology with music creation, and discuss its chances of winning the Grammy Awards.
The Beatles, who have left a lasting mark on music history, are competing for the Grammy Awards again after half a century. Their new song "Now and Then" produced with the help of AI technology was shortlisted for two awards: Best Production of the Year and Best Rock Performance, which allowed them to compete on the same stage with contemporary musicians such as Beyoncé and Sabrina Carpenter. It constitutes a musical picture with a strong sense of the times.
Paul McCartney decided last year to create the Beatles' final record. Unlike the AI deepfake technology that people may be worried about, McCartney chose a more sentimental approach: they used AI technology to restore a poor-sounding demo tape left by John Lennon in 1978.
This innovation was inspired by the documentary "The Beatles: Get Back" directed by Peter Jackson. In this 2021 work, dialogue editor Emile Delray used AI technology to successfully separate each member’s voice from the noisy background sound. The technology was later used by producer Giles Martin to recreate the stereo version of the band's 1966 album Revolver.
The principle of this AI audio processing technology is similar to the noise reduction function of video calling platforms such as FaceTime, Google Meet or Zoom. By training machine learning on a specific target—whether it’s a human voice on a video call or a specific instrument in a recording studio—AI is able to accurately isolate the target sound from a recording.
Interestingly, among the works shortlisted for the Best Production of the Year Award, "Now and Then" has the least Spotify plays, only 78 million times. This makes people think: Can this legendary band win in the competition with contemporary musicians such as Billie Eilish and Kendrick Lamar based solely on novelty? If back then people said that the Beatles were worse than Jesus Judging from red standards, today's Charli XCX seems to have reached this level.
The Beatles' Grammy journey is not only a music feast, but also a perfect collision of AI technology and artistic creation. Let us wait and see what the final result will be, and look forward to AI technology bringing more surprises in future music creation.