Last Updated on July 24, 2026 by Christian Adams
Part 2 of a three-part series on the influence of AI and digital technology in music and the rise of push-button monoculture in the arts.
On 12 separate occasions over the last 14 years of posting on BSM, I have written something along the lines of “digital technology ruined rock music in the early 1990s.” The debate between analog vs digital starts when studio-quality digital recording interfaces hit consumer markets. That’s when people stopped “learning how to play” their instruments, giving rise to the button-pusher culture of laptop warriors, DJs and electronic dance music.
First, I’m not here to argue that digital is “bad.” Without dumbing it down too much, since the beginning of time, music and technology have been quantum entangled. Technology is a tool that changes the medium, but the music is the conduit. Analog or digital shouldn’t matter. And frankly, I’ve used various advancements of tech all my life, from analog cassette 4-tracks AND 48-track ProTools rigs to synths, loopers, drum machines, plug-ins, et al.
I like technology in music because it helps me articulate the sounds I hear and want to create, without paying for a state-of-the-art recording studio or involving third-party decisions. The music still comes from within; the technology makes it presentable for human ears. However, the irony isn’t lost on me. I couldn’t have produced anything on this timeline without the very digital tech that I claim “ruined” rock music.
The Chips Ahoy! Dilemma
The original debate over analog versus digital recording was founded on sound quality, which, beyond a certain threshold of scientific measurement, is subjective from every angle. How does it sound? I don’t know. I only know how it sounds to me. Multiple studies and professional anecdotal evidence point to one conclusion: Most people can’t tell the difference between music recorded on analog or digital equipment.
If you’re eating a Chips Ahoy! chocolate chip cookie, and I ask, “How does it taste?” You might use one of several adjectives to describe your experience of the cookie. Delicious, average, sweet, etc.
“Is it good?” I persist.
“Yes, it is good,” you say.
“Is it better than a similar Pepperidge Farm Sausalito chocolate chunk macadamia nut cookie?”
“No. Maybe,” you stutter. “I like it. Chips Ahoy! has a better texture than Pepperidge Farm.”
This is the kernel of the original argument between analog and digital. Matters of discretion and taste.
Goodbye Analog, Hello Digital
In 1978, Soundstream built what could be considered the first digital audio workstation (DAW) using some of the most current computer hardware of the time.
By the late 1980s, several consumer-level computers, such as the Apple Macintosh, had enough power to wrangle digital audio editing. Engineers used programs like Soundedit with Microdeal’s Replay Professional and Digidesign’s Sound Tools and Sound Designer to edit audio samples for sampling keyboards like the E-mu Emulator II. Soon, music producers began to use these tools for simple two-track audio editing and CD mastering.
In the early to mid-1990s, many major recording studios went digital after Digidesign introduced its Pro Tools software, modeled after the traditional method and signal flow in most analog recording devices. At this time, most audio production platforms were Apple Mac-based. Around 1992, the first Windows-based DAWs started to emerge.
On top of DAWs, you had MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface), which, only scraping the surface of its potential, simulates a wide variety of electronic musical instruments. Within a matter of months, not years, consumer-based DAWs went to market, putting an incredibly powerful tool in the hands of anybody who could afford one.
Removed From the Equation
We’ve been overdubbing since the beginning of recorded sound, and the old “punch-in/punch-out” routine has saved many recordings from being trashed. Digital takes overdubbing and turns it inside out.
Overdubbing is a recording technique where a musician listens to an existing performance through headphones and plays a new part along with it to be captured on a separate track. This allows a single artist to layer multiple instruments or harmonies onto a song, or correct mistakes in a previous take, without needing a full band to perform live in the room together.
Meanwhile, musicians in the digital age can modify waveforms with unlimited precision. Cut, copy, paste, sync, loop, import, export, align, trim, sample rate, plot spectrum, file size, hardware buffer, and zero crossings are computer terms that generally have nothing to do with music. And now, with less computer aptitude than a toddler, you could open the music editing software that’s most likely on your computer, and record a song without ever getting up from your seat.
In a nutshell, digital recording made it possible for anybody to create music using a cut-and-paste formula. This presents the illusion of competence. It obliterates the “process” of learning how to play an instrument. You don’t need to play an instrument while sitting behind a console, composing mediocre symphonic ambient trance music with an eight-key MIDI controller and a wireless mouse.
When the actual ‘musician’ part is taken out of the musical equation, you get bullshit. You get freshly manicured, synchronized electronic noise. A huge component of art is the struggle to express yourself through the medium. Digital recording enables even the most ham-fisted musician to sound competent on their instrument.
The World As Our Marketplace
Perhaps my argument tends toward elitism, but music thrives on discretion. And so, this is where the Internet plays an important role in the big picture.
In August 1991, Tim Berners-Lee published a summary of the World Wide Web project on the newsgroup alt.hypertext. This date also marked the debut of the Web as a publicly available service on the Internet. For this reason, August 23 is considered Internaut’s Day, i.e., the Internet’s birthday.
Now, take that song you just recorded on your computer, rip it to MP3, and send it off into the world. Put it on YouTube, Tunecore, Spotify, Bandcamp, Soundcloud, and a dozen other streaming services, and promote the shit out of it on Facebook, X, and other social media platforms. Congratulations, you have just released your first single!
But think for a moment, if art museums started opening their doors to unsolicited submissions and upheld a promise to exhibit all works of fine art, just imagine what kind of thrift store menagerie you’d be walking into.
Maybe Music Shouldn’t Be “For Everyone”
I have never believed that music is for everyone, nor is painting for everyone. Learning an instrument, playing in a band, and facing and accepting failure time and time again are part of the natural selection process. That’s why there are so few half-assed trumpet players in music. You gotta be committed to playing that horn.
Though I don’t believe in it, I understand the idea that music can and should be for everyone, and the point of making music is not to make money, but to express something through the music, and that’s fine. Artists are free to express themselves in the digital format; it’s just that the bulk of it isn’t music. It’s something else now.
It’s the Process, Not the Sound
You can say such-and-such contemporary pop record is a great work of art, but it cannot be compared to a pop record made in 1966. Indeed, this has less to do with the music of the era than the way music will be made from here on out. And this is the main reason I think rock music started to die when DAWs went mainstream.
I’m not saying that digital music doesn’t sound great – it does. And this is not to say that great music hasn’t been made since 1992 – it has. But something fundamental about the process of making music was changed forever. Many purists and ethically-minded musicians will reject the digital ways, but we’ve long since crossed the threshold of critical mass. Our tools are now running the show by proxy.
Part 3 of the series covers the current scope of the AI music landscape, the implications of technology and limits, and its impact on the future of music and humanity.
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