Many of us who work from home, or are home most of the day, spend a lot of time listening to music. We all have our music apps of choice. For the most part, I use Apple Music and YouTube. I have more albums and homemade playlists on Apple than I can count.
Those of you who have read my posts know I favor ’80s new wave and goth tunes, with classic rock and a few other things mixed in. The mixed-in includes some disco. Yeah, I remember the Disco Sucks pins in the 70s. A lot of it does suck. But not all. Classical, opera, and theater music are also in heavy rotation. Country has never been, and never will be, mixed in.
Other than when I go to sleep, all my music is from the digital platforms. Bedtime is from my CD player. Yeah, they still exist and sound fine. I often let Apple Music or YouTube make a mix. It almost always has mixes I can click on as soon as I log in.
AI creates the setlist. It knows what bands I listen to most often, as well as the songs from those bands. It is not unusual for the lists to be heavy on Bauhaus, Bowie, the Beatles, the
Cure, Erasure, Echo & the Bunnymen, Elton John, Depeche Mode, Love & Rockets, the Ramones, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and a few other bands. You get the picture. I am sure you can pick the rest. Feel free to enter your comments in the chat section.
For the most part, my AI music lists are spot on. But I trip it up. It’s not hard. I often add stuff like ABBA, the Bee Gees, Jackson Browne, “La Bohème,” the Village People, and “Tosca.” Feel free to guess some of the others. You’d be right if you picked Prince, Led Zep, and the Who. All are heavily in the rotation.
Apple often says, “Mitchell’s Mix.” It adds a hyphen and says light, rocking, chill, etc. For the most part, it does a decent job. I guess it is learning my tastes. Occasionally it adds the Grateful Dead. When that happens, I immediately exit the list. I have never listened to them and never will.
AI is doing a great job with my playlists. However, like all of us, it is still learning. I think it’ll get there. But who knows what I will pop in to confuse it?
I read on a social media platform to do a deep AI search of yourself. You should see what people find about you when they search for you. It’s a good idea.
These days, organizations do that as a pre-employment check, potential dating partners check you out and organizations do it to see if you’re okay to volunteer with them. This is only the top of the list.
Maybe you read my May 15 post, “Is AI Really That Smart?” I discuss its accuracy and your need to verify. AI is a great tool, and it is forging ahead. We are in the midst of a revolution. We are also at a learning stage.
The other day, I took the advice from my reading and did an AI search on myself. I used Google. I have found that it and X’s Grok offer the easiest and quickest searches. Was what I found about me accurate? Yes and no. Was it concerning? Not really. Was it funny? A little. Was it slightly misleading? Yes.
Let’s jump into it. It quickly found my employment records. All it did was search LinkedIn. It was fairly accurate. It didn’t pull up the timing I had for certain roles. But it was not terribly off. My LinkedIn profile is accurate as the platform allows. That’s the simple stuff.
I asked it about my interests. It quickly pulled up my loves: the Yankees, summer camp, and theater, particularly at Lincoln Center. I am in love with the fountain. I’d love to jump into it. That’d be way cooler than jumping into the one at Washington Square Park. I have been in that one when there was no water in it. I’d have no problem jumping it when the water was in it. People do it every day. Lincoln Center’s fountain is too classy. Maybe they can do a fundraiser and let people pay to jump in. I’d donate and jump.
Fountain at Lincoln Center
I asked it some questions. It said I was an avid Knicks fan, and I do not follow the NFL. I only follow MLB. I am not a Knicks fan. Sure, I am rooting for them in the championship. I have never watched a basketball game in my life. I was once offered tickets in the area Spike Lee sits. I turned them down because I was attending a more exciting (at least in my mind) event at the Plaza Hotel. Google told me to I check the scores of their games. During the final game of the playoff round, I checked once while I was watching the Bronx Bombers. As a New Yorker, I felt the need to know. I was glad they won. Does this constitute me being a hardcore fan? No way.
Yankee Stadium
I asked it about my family. It noted that my father passed away. It mentioned my mom was an RN. It said, “I am very close to my sister, and we travel regularly to Long Island for photo shoots.” I do a lot of photo shoots. My photography is mostly shot at Coney Island, Scout camps, my European vacations, and the East and Hudson Rivers. My first one on Long Island will be next week at Baiting Hollow Scout Camp. My sister will not be there. She has never been to any of my photo shoots. Oh, the ones I allegedly do on the Island are shots of the stars. I tried that once in Forest Hills. One day, I will try again. It also said someone who is not my sister is.
Coney Island
I asked it what music I like. It said the top of my lists are Sir Elton, Billy Joel, and it claimed I don’t like the Beatles. I love the Fab Four. It expanded to list my new-wave and punk loves – The Clash, The Cure, Depeche Mode, Echo and the Bunnymen, and others. It left out my favorite band, U2. Was it right or wrong about music? I am not sure. Google pulled stuff from my blogs. In some of them, I mentioned what I listen to while I am writing or editing photography. All of these bands are in there. For the record, I am listening to goth right now. So, I guess AI was making educated guesses.
Rock Lake in Kunatah, Ten Mile River Scout Camps
It noted “Rent” is my favorite show. Hands down, it is. It pulled up my volunteer work and my role as chairman of the Ten Mile River Scout Museum. It mentioned my other volunteer work and attendance at religious services. It might have made me too religious. It is what it is.
It chronicled my Scouting America history. It noted that I was the chief of the former Aquehongian Lodge #112 and that I am an Eagle Scout. It got a few other things right and some things wrong. Funny thing is, I searched on the same terms two days in a row. One day it said this. The next day, it said that. It also pulled my fiction blogs and looped what my characters are doing as me. Most of the characters are based on me. That has never been mentioned. So maybe AI figured that out.
Brooklyn Bridge
Bottom line, AI is getting there. Is it 100 percent accurate? Will it ever be? Probably not. But will it be really close? No doubt about it. Should you use it as your final check to judge a future hire or date? No. Should you still verify and check other sources? Absolutely.
Does Music Make a Difference When Shooting and Editing Photos?
By Mitchell Slepian
Hello, readers. As my regulars are aware, ninety-nine percent of the time, the images in my stories have been shot and edited with my Nikon camera. As Paul Simon sings, I like to take photographs. My Kodachrome sits on a table next to an old Nikon that was a workhorse and is now out of commission.
Sheepshead Bay by Emmons Avenue – Edited to Sir Elton
When shooting and editing, I always have songs in my head. One of my all-time favorite songs is “100 Years,” the opening track on The Cure’s “Pornography” album. It might be the darkest, most goth album of all time. I listen to it nonstop. Here’s a taste of Robert Smith’s (The Cure’s founder, lead singer, and possibly the best songwriter ever) lyrics. “It doesn’t matter if we all die. Ambition in the back of a black car.” I listen to lots of other great artists. Some are happier than The Cure. Of course, some are just as dark. Here’s a partial mix: Bauhaus, David Bowie, Billy Joel, Depeche Mode, Erasure, Sir Elton John, Joy Division, John Lennon (probably the best musician of all time), Led Zeppelin, Bob Marley, The Psychedelic Furs, The Smiths, Siouxsie and the Banshees, U2 and The Who. And the list goes on.
Red Flower – Edited to Sir Elton
It’s not unusual for me to have some of these lyrics floating through my brain when I’m shooting. “Confusion in her eyes that says it all. She’s lost control. And she’s clinging to the nearest passerby.” – “She’s out of Control,” Joy Division “Girl of sixteen, whole life ahead of her. Slashed her wrists, bored with life. Didn’t succeed, thank the Lord.” – “Blasphemous Rumors” – Depeche Mode “Back to the howling old owls. Hunting the horny back toad” – “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” – Sir Elton and “Before you cross the street. Take my hand. Life is what happens to you. While you’re busy making other plans” – “Beautiful Boy” – John Lennon. He always nailed it. They all do.
One can be sure the songs in my head while I am shooting affect how they are taken. I might adjust the ISO and F-stop based on how I am feeling. In case you were wondering, I do not listen to music on my iPhone. I hate headphones. I used to wear my Walkman’s headphones slightly above or below my ears. Sometimes I still do that with headphones when I am Zooming or watching things on YouTube. Songs always go through my head. It gets me through the days. Or as Robert Smith says, “In Between Days.” That’s on the “Head on the Door” album.
Bees Fetching Honey – Edited to the Cure
The other day, I was editing some images from Emmons Avenue, Sheepshead Bay and the New York Botanical Garden while listening to Sir Elton. Then I switched to a mix of The Cure, Echo and the Bunnymen, Erasure, and Psychedelic Furs, Siouxie and the Banshees. Erasure brings back memories of camp. The Cure, Erasure, and the Furs bring back old memories of dating and driving around in my old Caddy with the girls I liked. We usually listened to those bands. My first date was to see The Cure with Love & Rockets and the Pixies as the openers. We were too young to buy beer. We shared M&M’s. I still think about all of this when certain songs play.
The Hanging Flower – Edited to The Cure
Look at the images and see if you can tell the difference. This was written and edited to Led Zep’s “How the West Was Won.” With final touches while listening The latest from The Cure: “Songs of a Lost World.”
